I'm wanting to use a floppy drive read/write head (removed from the drive) to read other types of magnetic media, but I can't find any specs on it. What I need is some idea which pins are which, and what voltages etc. to use.
I've got the head out of the drive, and it has a ribbon coming out of it which terminates in five contacts. Any ideas where to start or where I might go (other forums, webpages etc.) to find this info?
Kemmotar
Find the head amp chip. Look up the part data. Trace the wires.
I suspect one wire shield, two wires to the actual read/write head, and two wires for the 'tunnel erase' used when writing.
Thomas
I recall that an old National Semiconductor Application Note on drive PLLs contained the words "National Semiconductors can't vouch for the sanity of enyone who ventures beyond this point".
That's kind of what I was thinking. I also thought I might try plugging the drive (minus the head) into the computer power supply and testing to see what voltages etc. I have coming to the head. Of course that may not work if the computer can tell that I don't have a disk in and so doesn't send any power to the head.
Alternatively I could just try various things... I've got a virtually unlimited supply of heads (brother in law rebuilds computers) so if I burn a few out it's not that big a deal!
Thanks for the suggestions!
Kemmotar
It is a rather insane project, but those are the best kind! If you fail there's little dissapointment, and if you succeed there's great satisfaction!
Just took the back cover off the head, and I can now see that two wires go to one side, which is red, and two go to the other side, which is green. I'm guessing that the red side is the erase head, and the green side is the read/write head. I'm going to proceed on that theory anyhow!
Kemmotar
For the effort involved in getting it working.... I'd want a bigger reward :-)
As in top and bottom of the disk? Floppies are double-sided...
No... I only have one of the heads out... the one off the top actually. The other one, that would read/write the other side of the floppy, is still in the drive. The head itself is color coded... the left side is red, and the right is green. I'm just guessing about what the colors mean, but I think it's a reasonable guess.
Kemmotar
On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 09:01:20 -0500, Kemmotar put finger to keyboard and composed:
Did you locate the head amp IC? If not, I have the circuit diagram for the original IBM 5.25" 1.2MB FDD. Perhaps it can help you understand how things work??? Let me know if you want it.
- Franc Zabkar
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