From: Blackepyon01@yahoo.ca   
      
   On Friday, 30 December 2022 at 08:12:36 UTC-8, Black Epyon wrote:   
   > On Thursday, 29 December 2022 at 15:27:06 UTC-8, jfrior...@gmail.com wrote:    
   > > Hi All,    
   > > I recently purchased my first computer. Tandy 1000EX and it works great   
   with one exception.. When I try to format a 5.25 floppy to use to copy some of   
   the software I have I continue to get an error. Was wondering if maybe the   
   write head is not doing    
   well, or needs to be cleaned. I have no issues when I format and write to my   
   3.5 external.    
   > > Any thoughts?    
   > > Thank you all!    
   > > John   
   > Take the drive apart. Clean the heads and rails with alcohol soaked Q-tips,   
   then apply some lithium grease to the rails (make sure not to get any on the   
   heads). Even just cleaning gunk off the rails with alcohol will allow them to   
   slide more freely,    
   and may improve the error rate. After 35-40 years, all these 5.25" drives need   
   to be cleaned out and lubed. That's just to eliminate the obvious.    
   >    
   > Can we assume that you're using 360K disks and not 1.2MB, and that you've   
   verified the disk is good on the other machine you're copying software from?   
   I've been doing the same with a PC-Jr I recently acquired. I thought at first   
   it was the drive that    
   was the issue, only to discover that the drive itself is good, and half of all   
   my disks are bad.    
   >    
   > Also, make sure the drive that came with your EX is actually a 360K drive,   
   and not 1.2MB. You can use a 1.44MB drive in lieu of a 720K (one of the drives   
   on my HX is actually a 1.44MB, even though the machine can only recognize it   
   as 720K), but a 1.2MB    
   drive can NOT be used on that controller.    
   >    
   > I'm jealous that you have an external Tandy floppy though. Those are hard to   
   come by these days.    
   >    
   > ---Kyle   
   Also: If you're taking the drive apart to clean it, be careful not to remove   
   the heads. Those are a PITA to realign. There might be a shroud over top of   
   the heads that you'll need to remove, but you should be able to reach   
   everything you need to with Q-   
   tips, and that's easier than disassembling the entire drive.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)