A 500 Franken project

[quarkx]

Huston we have a small problem,
I woke up this morning thinking, I am missing the LED's for this.oh:
Not a big deal, he can live without them, but if anyone has a set for trade or something, let me know

Nevermind, I forgot it's on the keyboard.
Way too early in the morning to be going over the details of my Amiga's...is that coffee ready yet?.........

 

[quarkx]

Update!

Update!

Just a small update for those that are watching. Like I said, I found a drive that works! It was a PC converted drive or a A600/1200 drive, so the factory cable is a wee bit too short.
I am waiting on the plastics back, My buddy caught a bad cold from his kids over the weekend, so I am really at a halt until I get them back. All thats really left, is the assembly of the unit and fine tuning the floppy drive placing and button. I work at noon today for an 11 hr shift, so tomorrow is soldering day!.
I found in my stash, a Supra Ram/Clock Expansion, so the battery will be swapped out for a new battery holder and battery.
There is no corrosion on this one (obviously) but the battery died long time ago, and since it is impossible to remove the battery without replacing the whole holder, that will be done. All and all a 10 min job.

 

[quarkx]

Looking good so far; you planning to retro-bright it or just cleaning up in general?

I have those same two A500 motherboards (gold & green) that I pulled from two of my systems here (to replace with A500+ PAL motherboards). They appear to be the same year and chips as yours (except the one fat angus) and all three that I have are from Ontario, Rev5 and vary slightly in rework too.

FYI I believe ALL the Canadian Amiga's came from the Ontario plant (Scarborough )

 

[rkauer]

Glen, if the original A500 floppy data cable is too short, use the one from the A600, way longer than the A500's one.

 

[quarkx]

Glen, if the original A500 floppy data cable is too short, use the one from the A600, way longer than the A500's one.

We think alike, for thats what I grabbed and it was fine. Thanks.
I have a few floppy cables, but you are right, the A600 was the one that was closest to the fit, without having a ton of extra length.

 

[quarkx]

Battery Swap.

Battery Swap.

Ok, not much to show today, but fired up the soldering Iron, and replaced the battery. Now off to get shipping done before work. Just got to pick a new battery up on the way to work.
SHAMELESS PLUG ALERT:

If you are wondering where i got the Holders, I got them from AmigaKit, They fit perfectly. :lol

 

[quarkx]

Assembly

Assembly

Ok, I got the shells and keyboard back last night.
Today, Pending if I can find all the screws, final assembly is in the works.
I am taking a small break as the SD card is full and the batteries on the camera are re-charging.
I started with the keyboard. putting all the micro-screws back in and sliding the motherboard back into place. Not really much to see in the photos.

 

[quarkx]

Almost ready to boot!

Almost ready to boot!

ok, so yesterday was swamped, but I managed to get the floppy drive all aligned. I found and installed an RF shield. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't have bothered, but because kids will have access to this machine, I thought putting one in might prevent something from getting spilled or pushed inside and protect the motherboard somewhat (yea, I know, the "Kid" factor is well harder to predict than string theory). I then hooked up the keyboard and put the outer shell on. Now, the biggest challenge, finding the 6 case screws. If I was thinking a whole while ago, I would have bagged and labelled them, but no, hindsight, I am an idiot.
hopefully mu hunt will prevail, last thing I want to do is wrap this in duct tape to hold it all together.
Tomorrow, hopefully we can do the boot thing and test if its all good.

 

[quarkx]

Well, I might as well buy a lotto ticket today,
I found one of my plastic bins with 6 torx screws in it, Every other screw I have is Philips so guess what?
Of course they worked but the floppy is presenting some goofiness, Its aligned properly, but it real tight. If this was strictly an adults machine, that would not be an issue, but because kids are going to use it, They won't be able to swap disks without calling for Daddy. Umm think on this.

 

[quarkx]

So, I bit of an update on this thread.
I got the floppy drives in from Exilent last week sometime, so today I had planed to do 2 things:
Upgrade the 1.3 Rom and install the new drive and I should be done.
So last night, I did the Rom upgrade solder as in the other thread.
I tore apart the A500 and Put the new roms in, but they did not work. I am not sure what the issue was (possibly a grounded pin 31, or one of the pins was not quite in the socket-or the ROM was dead), but I swapped back the 1.3 Rom and everything was fine. I then put the "New" floppy drive and and booted a disk. It reads great, so I put everything back together. Now the floppy drive won't work at all. I suspect that the ground screw for the keyboard is preventing this, but Since I got to start getting ready for work soon, I decided to leave that to another day.oh:
We know the floppy drive works just fine, now it has to do with the keyboard being plugged in, I might just have to get another keyboard on there.

Anyways, some pictures of the mess.