My NES only recognises tilted cartridges

I bought a NES off a thrift shop and while it works, it only seem to work when I tilt the carts to the right after insertion. also, I have some pirate copy of super mario bros 3 (it's a famicom cart with converter) but I can't seem to get it to work on my nes. What could I do?

 

Snip the 10 nes chip. Click here for info. Someone needs to make a sticky about the 10 nes chip with as many questions a week we get that are solved by disabling it.

 

Classic case of dodgy 72 pin connector.
Honnestly, if it works just by tilting the cart, it is already better off than many NES.

If you want it to work perfectly there are a few things you can do.

1. Deactivate CIC chip inside console ( supposed to help )
2. Replace the 72 pin connector. ( although many people think those new chinese ones are worse than the original ones )
3. Refurbish the old one. There are many techniques to go about it. Some googling will net you a lot of stuff.
*Avoid the boiling trick, it barely even works.
*Avoid the pin straitening, very tedious and chances are you will ruin the connector.
*Use a soft metal polish + water + toothbrush on the connector. ( supposed to work well )
*Use Deoxit ( supposed to work well )

 

Not likely the problem, usually it is the console 72 pin connector that needs the pins rebent or replacement with a new connector. The 10NES Chip only reads a couple of the pins on the 72 pin connector, goes into its reboot cycle if it cannot detect the matched chip in the game cart.

@ everett - The previous owner might have used a Game Genie which really destroys the internal console slot due to the card edge being thicker then a game cart.

 

I just disabled the 10nes chip. I didn't have any proper tools so I had to resort to using the tip of a steak knife to pry the pin apart. it broke off from the chip but thankfully it hasn't damaged anything and the nes still works, thank heavens. now that this is out of the way, I still have the problem with the nes only recognising tilted carts. I'll look for a fix.

 

I finished fixing the connector and all. the cartridge rack won't pull down anymore but that doesn't matter since the cartridge works wether the rack is pulled down or not. Still, super mario bros has issues being recognised and I assume that the famicom converter for SMB3 is busted or something, but now I don't have to fight anymore to get my other games working c: (and I LOVE air fortress)

 

That's most likely because you didn't reassemble the cart tray properly. If you look carefully at the bottom of it, there's a lip which goes over the edge of the motherboard. If that lip is sitting on the motherboard as opposed to being underneath, the tray won't lock down.

 

Eh, for a first time I managed to fix my nes' biggest problem and also got to disable the 10nes chip without killing the console, That's not bad

 

Whenever the NES is involved people always think about the system's connector but I rarely ever see anyone ask if they've bothered to clean their cartridges. These cartridges are decades old now and many have never been cleaned. In my experience the problem is usually dirty cartridges. Even if you clean the system connector if you don't clean the cartridges the problems will return.

 

I cleaned the cartridges at the same time I cleaned the connector, just to be sure.

EDIT: While the console was disassembled, I noticed some sort of expansion port underside the motherboard. did that ever get used for anything?

 

intended for an NES famicom disk system type addon but it never surfaced

 

I just got an NES and it kind of worked. Cleaned the pin connector and it works a lot better. Yay for me.