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Floppy disk (3,5") problem in 386

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First post, by RobinOfTheWood

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Hi guys/gals

New here (so, Hi all! 😀 ) - I hope I selected the correct forum for the topic.

So, as title says, I have a problem with 3,5 inch floppy in old 386 (Amd 386-40) system.
I got constant "Data Read error" or "Sector not found" etc... and yes, I am trying to read very old disks so one should expect that.
But, here's the twist in the story. After pressing (A)bort or (R)etry lots of times, sometimes I do get the prompt and then, all of a sudden, the disk starts to work and for a bit it works great (reading disks that didn't even give a prompt before, reading all the data no problem). And then, at any time, ... the problem returns and I have to do the whole (A)bort, (R)etry thing all over again.

Anyone has any idea what's going on? I mean, I doubt the diskettes are to blame, as the majority are readable once I get over the error messages.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Reply 1 of 4, by dionb

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Sounds like dirty heads and/or issues with the drive motor.

Cotton buds with meths can help with the former, disassembly and removing gunk around the stepper motor with the latter.

Reply 2 of 4, by RobinOfTheWood

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dionb wrote on 2021-08-30, 09:21:

Sounds like dirty heads and/or issues with the drive motor.

Cotton buds with meths can help with the former, disassembly and removing gunk around the stepper motor with the latter.

Thanks. I tried the former (cotton buds) - didn't help, but didn't fully disassemble the drive yet.
But still, don't you think that it's strange that when it starts working, it works normally for, let say, 30 minutes and then all of a sudden stops working again.

Or is this normal behaviour for old (dirty) drives?

Reply 3 of 4, by dionb

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RobinOfTheWood wrote on 2021-08-30, 09:24:
[...] […]
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[...]

Thanks. I tried the former (cotton buds) - didn't help, but didn't fully disassemble the drive yet.
But still, don't you think that it's strange that when it starts working, it works normally for, let say, 30 minutes and then all of a sudden stops working again.

Or is this normal behaviour for old (dirty) drives?

Thing is, there's one way for drives to work correctly and an infinite number of ways it can go wrong.

The very fact that it takes a while to get it working, it then works for a while then stops sounds like something very physical and temperature-dependent to me, which is why I suspect greasy gunk (combination of lubricant with dust) around the stepper.

Reply 4 of 4, by RobinOfTheWood

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dionb wrote on 2021-08-30, 09:31:
RobinOfTheWood wrote on 2021-08-30, 09:24:
[...] […]
Show full quote

[...]

Thanks. I tried the former (cotton buds) - didn't help, but didn't fully disassemble the drive yet.
But still, don't you think that it's strange that when it starts working, it works normally for, let say, 30 minutes and then all of a sudden stops working again.

Or is this normal behaviour for old (dirty) drives?

Thing is, there's one way for drives to work correctly and an infinite number of ways it can go wrong.

The very fact that it takes a while to get it working, it then works for a while then stops sounds like something very physical and temperature-dependent to me, which is why I suspect greasy gunk (combination of lubricant with dust) around the stepper.

OK will try to dissasemble and completely clean the drive.
Never done that before, so it should be, ehm, ... fun 😀

Thanks for the help.

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