Back again with those rather questionable replacement PlayStation CD mechanisms! I’ve been experimenting with the spindle assemblies to see whether I can salvage anything useful from them. After all, I’ve got a collection of PlayStations that need good disc-retaining hubs, and it seems a shame to waste all these parts.

The main problem with the replacement mechanisms is the spindle height. The motor shafts are shorter than the ones in the original PlayStation drives I’ve been working with, so the plastic hub doesn’t sit where it should. In some cases, it simply comes loose when you remove a disc.

I figured I could remove the plastic hubs from the replacement mechanisms and fit them onto the original motors instead. Unfortunately, that turned out to be rather more difficult than I’d expected.

I managed to break quite a few of them while experimenting. I had about nine replacement mechanisms to work with, and I reckon four of the hubs were damaged before I found a better way of removing them. Wonderful!

Eventually I discovered that using a couple of thin plastic cards to support the hub from underneath made the job much easier. By applying the lifting force more evenly, I could remove the plastic piece without putting quite so much pressure on one side.

And there it is! A disc-retaining hub removed in one piece, ready to be fitted onto a better spindle motor. That’s a result!

Of course, the height still matters. Push the hub too far down and the disc may rub against the mechanism. Leave it sitting too high and the laser can have trouble focusing properly. So it’s not simply a matter of pushing the thing on as far as it will go.

I’ll need to fiddle with the positioning and then see whether the thing will actually read discs. At least I now know how to get the hub off without destroying it. That’s a step in the right direction, even if I haven’t got a fully working drive to show for it just yet.

Still, after breaking a few of those blasted plastic hubs, it’s rather nice to find a way of removing one without destroying it.

Where is that PSIO project anyway? I’m beginning to think life without all these troublesome PlayStation CD mechanisms would be considerably easier!