I just took some pics for the Wallstreet-hinge-page I intend to eventually construct and in the meantime thought a contact sheet might be of some interest:
<http://mywebpages.comcast.net/macdan/images/hinge.jpg> Broken hinges and a pair of still-good-hinges with my breakage-prevention-solution(?) :-) I hope, anyway. What I found interesting and what got me photographing was my discovery of where an awful lot of the screen free-play originates (at least in the parts I have.) The steel hinge 'pin' is very small where it is stuffed into the pot-metal frame of the LCD support. The end of the frame has a hole and the hinge pin is retained inside that hole with some tiny splines. There's an awful load on such a small area and most play I see is in the hinge_pin-to-support location rather than in the clutch area. As for my breakage-prevention-solution, I figured since typically Wallstreet hinges fail when the clutch pack breaks apart its housing, if I reinforced the housing area it might make it tougher for it to spread out the housing and begin to break. I used some thin but stout steel sheeting to fab a pair of clips to surround the clutch housings where the stress is the greatest (I think.) The pair of clips you'll see on the hingepin are part of a set of 11 (or 12? I'm not sure now), and they tightly grip the hingepin to provide the clutch action. They're captured inside the clutch housing by their two little feet caught under slots in either side of the housing's interior. As the display is opened and closed those little feet push with all their might against the slots, evetually tearing free as the housing spreads apart and breaks open. Ideally I'd have used a flat steel ring forced onto the rectangular shape of the housing to completely surround the breakage-prone-area, but as I had nothing on hand of a proper size I just fabbed a 'C' shaped clip instead. My greatest concern is that any force great enough to spread out the sides of the clutch housing will probably spread my 'C' clip as well. However, I'm convinced the clutch housing is now stronger than it was and as this is just a hobby 'Book anyway, it won't see much use before I tear it apart and re-do it 'properly'. I also forced some grease into the clutch assembly, I 'think' that smoothed out the action a tad. Wheel bearing grease, in case yer wondering. Hey, it's all I had on the nearby basement shelf, and I was much too lazy to trudge upstairs to look for anything else. :-) One last thought . . . if somehow one could remove a couple of the clips from each hinge it would ease the stress on the housing and reduce the likelyhood of failure. However, I have no idea how greatly that would affect the ability of the LCD to remain upright . . . hmmmmmmmm Anyway, view the pics and let me know what you think, Dan K ................................. http://macdan.n3.net/ carracho://dankephoto.dhs.org:9700 hotline://dankephoto.dhs.org:9500 ................................. -- G-Books is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | -- Check our web site for refurbished PowerBooks | & CDRWs on Sale! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> G-Books list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-books.html> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:"; Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/g-books%40mail.maclaunch.com/> --------------------------------------------------------------- >The Think Different Store http://www.ThinkDifferentStore.com ---------------------------------------------------------------
