ZX Microdrive Chronicles - Felt, Rubber, and Emulation with the VLA1 and vDriveZX 

Just an update, got the rollers that you have mentioned in the video. WOW what an improvement on the microdrives!! I have used them on a QL and they work perfectly 👍I ordered 10 and made several mistakes making the hole bigger but finally figured it out. Both drives are much quieter and just sound better, Thanks so much for this idea !! I have some 3D printed rollers but the quality is not so good. Hope that you see my comments as I am really pleased with the results 😎

flux on the joins to desolder helps a lot

i had this happen i just put a drop of superglue on the top of the bar it fixes it without having to get another roller, also i put a link to fairly cheap felts on spectrum for everyone about a year ago or was it spectrum for show one of those two, r n k media cassette tape replacement felt pressure pads not dirt cheap but around 6 quid and i was able to do about 180 carts

Have the same desolder gun. Flux, quick messy reflow drag and then the circular motion making sure to lift in the centre works wonders. I think the original factory's soldering don't have enough material to fill the hole of the nozzle to create suction.

Thanks for the demonstration on the microdrives cheers.

I found the same with the 3D printed rollers on both my QL and ZX Microdrives and I’ve used up my stock of NOS Sinclair ones so the roller tip is extremely useful thank you. Have found the roller to be the number 1 issue with them. For the cartridges I’ve used 8 track felt cut to the right size and thickness as I read regular felt can cause static issues but useful to know it worked fine here.

Great video - I have 2 micro drives that stopped working - I can add this to my checklist of things to look for. The rollers in AliExpress sold out quick - so will have to wait for them to be back in stock.

Hi thanks for doing this, I need replacement rollers for my microdrive and now I know where to get them from 👍 I think that the microdrive with the heatsink and black cables is from the QL.

7:52 The desolder gun sounds like a cow mooing.

Use a bit of flux with the de-solder gun!

I found when my QL wasn't reading MDs I flipped the roller over and it had less wear which worked ok as a quick fix.

Really interesting video. Hats off to you for sharing the Aliexpress link, what adhesive did you use for sticking the new felt pads on with?

🛸

Great video! I am in the middle of fixing one myself. But I think it is a lost cause. The tapehead upper tape head is not measuring any resistance (OL) and the lower is 13~14 ohm. I recon both need to be the same? I sincerely hoping i am wrong :D Since replacing the heads will be near impossible without another spare microdrive.

Hi Jim I was interested to see the Harlequin is compatible with Interface 1 out of the box. Does it have 100% edge connector compatibility in the sense that ANY interface made for a real Spectrum will plug in and work like it would on a real Spectrum?

Is the ULA in a microdrive (QL and spectrum) and the one inside the interface one, all the same ULA as in the speccy itself?

Hi! I'm enjoying a lot your microdrive videos. You see what happens in your video that, while formatting, the screen turns white and the black stripes stop? That's happening to me, the CAT never ends (must be stopped), and while formatting, stripes appear like for 10 seconds but then the screen goes white and the microdrive keeps turning forever. Do you have an idea of where the problem could lie? I've tested several microdrives. Thanks!

Could a piece of software say a wordprocessor like tasword +3 ise the microdrives 8 cartridges to store tge taspell spell checker