Post by dschult3 on Oct 13, 2023 14:33:22 GMT
My son wanted to play our original Nintendo Wii a few weeks back, and lo and behold, the disc drive was acting up. I took it apart, and it looked like the system was dropped by one of my kids, and the disc drive had multiple pieces out of alignment. I tried to fix it, but then I realized that a gear was cracked (but still working, for now), and a tiny torsion spring was missing ( I later found it.) Every time I seemed to fix something, another part was misaligned. After a few hours of messing with it, I decided to replace the disc drive. I bought the drive from Honglei, because their drives are able to play GameCube discs as well. It wasn't difficult to replace it, and I used the guide from iFixit.
Nintendo Wii Disc Drive Replacement
The replacement seems to be working perfectly for now. I did read a comment about opening it up and cleaning the laser. Unfortunately once I did that, I realized that the disc drive was dirty as hell. I don't know if it is used, because it was sold as new, but it obviously has been sitting on a warehouse shelf for years, and dust built up inside the drive. There wasn't any rust or corrosion, but there was pitting on the metal parts. I lubricated the moving parts with silicone lubricate. Everything is running great, thus far.
After playing some games, we noticed the A button needed to be pressed really hard on one of the Wii motes for it to work. Yesterday, I took the controller apart and cleaned the heck out of it. It was incredibly gross, but now it looks brand new. The A button works perfectly. If you need to do the same, here is a video I watched to make sure I didn't mess it up. It isn't that difficult. All it takes is a Y screw driver, Q-tips, and some isopropyl alcohol. I also used some Dawn dish soap to clean the strap.
So what have you repaired? I've done some basic maintenance on my Super Nintendo, its controllers, and on the Atari paddle controllers we have here too. I'd like to use this thread as a guide for the forum. It felt really good restoring and refurbishing an old console and a controller.
Nintendo Wii Disc Drive Replacement
The replacement seems to be working perfectly for now. I did read a comment about opening it up and cleaning the laser. Unfortunately once I did that, I realized that the disc drive was dirty as hell. I don't know if it is used, because it was sold as new, but it obviously has been sitting on a warehouse shelf for years, and dust built up inside the drive. There wasn't any rust or corrosion, but there was pitting on the metal parts. I lubricated the moving parts with silicone lubricate. Everything is running great, thus far.
After playing some games, we noticed the A button needed to be pressed really hard on one of the Wii motes for it to work. Yesterday, I took the controller apart and cleaned the heck out of it. It was incredibly gross, but now it looks brand new. The A button works perfectly. If you need to do the same, here is a video I watched to make sure I didn't mess it up. It isn't that difficult. All it takes is a Y screw driver, Q-tips, and some isopropyl alcohol. I also used some Dawn dish soap to clean the strap.
So what have you repaired? I've done some basic maintenance on my Super Nintendo, its controllers, and on the Atari paddle controllers we have here too. I'd like to use this thread as a guide for the forum. It felt really good restoring and refurbishing an old console and a controller.
