1050 Drive Transport Into an INDUS GT Rich Mier, SPACE, St.Paul, Mn. My Indus Disk Drive has a lot of miles on it and, alas, was comming up with some Strange Errors. After swapping all the socketed chips on the main board, I determined that it must have a bad Read/Write head. By now I had been using it with the case removed, the Deck resting on the top of the front panel and a wooden pencil across the rear beneath the deck. The TANDON Part No. is 211014-001 and checking around town, I could find no replacement deck, anywhere. Everyone I talked to said I'd have to send it back to Future Systems, or at least go to them for a new deck. I can't afford to lose my disk. I only have one as I have a 320K XE and a 256K MIO. All I need is one when I have 2-192K RAMDISKS available. American Techna- Vision advertises a direct replacement Mechanism for a 1050 Drive so I called them to see if it would work in the Indus. They didn't know and couldn't even give me a Tandon Part Number. They did say that they have gotten orders from small companys that repair Indus drives. Taking a chance, I ordered one on the condition that I could return it if it wouldn't work. $47.50 plus shipping and UPS 2nd day Air. Total, $56.00. Cheaper than what it was going to cost me if I had to take it to a Dealer or send it out to be fixed. Monday evening I ordered it and Thrusday afternoon it showed up. I checked the Part Number first. Different! Part No. 216024-019. Digging out the wires, I found a couple markings that were the same. Mechanicly, it was the same, but on closer examination there were several differences. 1) There was no Timing hole sensors. 2) The plug comming from the Stepper motor had 6 wires versus 5 on the old deck (both have a 6 wire connector). Also, the colors were completely different. 3) The wires comming from the drive motor where the same color, but about 3 inches shorter. (The Dirve motors where identical.) 4) The micro switch aganist the rod used to twist and engage the floppy had 3 wires on it and the old one, 2. 5) There was 1 less connector plugs. Cutting some plastic tie-wraps on both decks, I traced out the wires. Here's what I found: The missing connector is J12 (4 pins) on the old deck. It is the timming hole sensor. Well, Atari doesn't use the timming hole. Ignoring it, I went on. The three wire connector marked '14' on the new drive is the Micro switch marked '5' on the old one and isn't used. The two wire connector marked 'J12' on the new drive is also 'J12' on the new one. It is the front LED and isn't used on the Indus. 'J11' on both decks is the Write Protect Sensor. 'J10' on the new deck is the same as 'J09' on the old one. The head 'Track 00' sensor. The wire from the R/W head is a 5 pin connector, same as the old drive, and is long enough to work. There is a difference in colors of the wires to which pins, but the Ground is right. I assumed the difference in wire colors is because of a different manufacture of the head itself and that the plug was wired correctly to work. The last one was the Stepper Motor plug, J3 on the old one and '15' on the new deck. A six wire connector. The stepper motors were made by two different companys so maybe it would work as is. Also, on the Indus motor control board, pin 6 was not used. No foil connected to it. Here is what must be done to make it work: 1. Remove the Motor Control board from the top of the old drive. Note that all the plugs are marked on their top side. 2. The two screws on the top right of the new drive must have the lock washers removed so the motor control board will fit. 3. Arrange and tape the wires comming from the R/W head the same as the old drive. 4. Now the only tricky part of this. The wires comming from the motor are too short. On the Motor Control Board, remove the 4 wire connector (marked J4 on the board) for the motor plug, J1. Use a small soldering iron and a solder 'Sucker'. Turn it around so the pins are pointing to the left and re-solder it in place. 5. Install the Motor Control Board and cardboard insulators on the new deck, taking care to position the R/W connector and that the board and insulators clear the top floppy idler hub. 6. Connect the R/W, 5 pin connector with the '0' up, the same as it was on the original. 7. You will have to cut some plastic tie-wraps to free the drive motor wires. Turn the connector UPSIDE-DOWN, so the 'J1' marking is down and the 4 pin retaining slots are up and plug it into the connector pins that you turned around. Be sure they won't interfer with the head movement. 8. Run the Stepper Motor connector up through the frame as was done on the old deck and plug into the 6 pin connector, the marking '15' up. On mine, the 2 red wires were towards the front of the drive, pin 5 and 6. 9. Locate and clean the two mount holes on the left side of the drive where the lable is. 10. On the left side of the old drive, mark on the frame above the 3 plugs, the 'J' number found on each of the 3, 4 pin connectors as you remove them. 11. Loose the two screws holding the front panel to the Indus frame. On older drives, you might have to remove it as the panel connectors on the bottom board where too high for the deck to clear them. 12. Remove the old drive, 2 screws on each side of the frame, and lift it out. Now is the time to fix that front door if you've had problems with it. 13. With a screwdriver, pry off the front lever on Both drives and swap them. The lever on the new one is too long to fit through the front panel and work. 14. Keeping the wires clear, install the new deck, adjust it's position and snug the two screws holding the front panel to the frame. Plug the rear Flat Cable into the Control board. 15. There should be four connectors at the left, rear. The two wire (J12) and the three wire (14) won't be used. Tuck these away at the rear so the are out of the way and won't short to anything. 16. Find the connector marked J10 and plug this into the front most pins where J09 was on the old deck. 17. Find the connector marked J11 and plug this into the rear most pins where the old J11 was. There, that's it. The now unused pins, J12, won't be used and isn't needed. They were for the Timing Hole sensor. If you REALLY want to, you Could maybe pry out the LED and sensor from your old drive and reinstall them, but WHY? They aren't needed. One thing I did learn from trouble shooting my problem. The Floppy Controller Chip used is capable of controlling a Double Sided drive. It's a Western Digital, 2797 type. Anyone need a challenge? How about a kit for a 5 1/4 inch Double Sided, Double Density drive or how about a 3 1/2 inch drive? 80 tracks, double sided is 720K. Richard Mier C-Serve 73537,3573 GEnie RBMIER