Hey guys I recently took apart my N64 joystick after it lost all it's centering abilities and discovered what looked like to be a baby powder substance in the bowl shaped indentation inside the joystick. Well I cleaned it out just thinking it was residue from the controller grinding down after years of use. What I want to know is if it was something that was meant to proitect the controller. If so what exactly did I do to damage the controller now that it's all cleaned out? Thanks in advanced.
Yeah that's what I thought but there was just too much of it for normal wear. It looked like at least a tablespoon worth of the stuff. Also the joystick didn't seem to be worn down at all.
I think it's mostly dead skin from your thumb along with salt from sweat and some worn plastic. Still not as nasty as the dark gunk that builds up in between the join lines around the edge!
Hmm it seemed too fine and uniform to be dead skin. It had the consistancy of baby powder. I could see it being worn plastic but the stick didn't seem too worn and there was too much of the powder. I watched a couple of videos on youtube and they all experience the same thing when taking the joystick apart. Also great advatar bobzee!
nontheless, i would refrain from putting graphite powder or anytihng in there until you research it some, dont want to do anytihng that could potentially damage it.
It does feel more rough than before so I'm going to see if graphite powder does anything. Does anybody know if Graphite powder can conduct an electrical charge great enough to harm the controller?
I have opened up a practically new official controller before now, and the 'white powder' is not present. I am positive it is just the plastic wearing down. When the controller is new the plastic is very smooth and shiny, but after some use the plastic wears down and creates the 'white powder' so it isnt smooth anymore. The powder probably does 'help' (If you can call it that) in that the stick will move abit smoother (the powder acts abit like tiny ball bearings), but the powder isnt perfectly smooth so will also have a sandpaper like action, grinding down even more of the plastic. The best thing to do is apply some 'plastic grease' frequently used on RC cars. This will help the analogue stock move freely and smoothly, heres a guide if your interested:- http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/console/nintendo/n64cont.htm Hope that helps ;-)
Hey Assembler what are the chances that the joysticks in the Beta and Alpha controllers you have would fit into a standard N64 controller?
they both do share the shutter-optical design for locating stick movement though, unlike potentiometer-based analogue sticks on controllers (PSX, GC, XBOX, Wii etc)
What I mean is the actual unit itself interchangeable? Does it have a 6 pin connector to the controller's main board?
I just got some plastic grease and it works great! I also stretched the spring out to make it stiffer.
