A sad day…long story short sticky arcade buttons (advice?)
Alright so last night I had a girlfriend over and sometime into the second bottle of wine she ended up accidentally spilling a glass on my desk and more importantly, my Midifighter spectra. Now we wiped everything up all nice and quick, tested everything out and all seemed fine.. but now 24 hours later 6 of the buttons are super sticky, 2 to the point where the actually get stuck pressed down sometimes and have to be pried back up.
Has anyone got advice on how to take apart and clean a spectra without fucking it up? If not, any solutions on how to clean it from the outside somehow or should I just give up and buy a new midifighter?
Cant give you any advice on taking it apart (I’d just wing it) .. once inside though I’d go flushing the buttons and board out with this stuff followed by some air duster, best solvent cleaner I’ve ever used TBH, saved needing to replace my APC pots and Macbook Trackpad.
Deevey had good advice, a good solvent cleaner should eventually flush it out, un screw the bottom acrylic and remove the sleeve and then flush the buttons out with the cleaner until they get loosen up, it might take a few tries, especially with wine!
Just make sure it is nice and dry before connecting the USB again. Feel free to email me at michael@djtechtools.com if this doesnt help!
Thanks for all the advice guys… unfortunately I took it apart and tried cleaning off the wine and then reassembled it and initially it appeared to be working fine but turns out I must have somehow did some damage cause now the buttons are fucked and don’t respond how they’re supposed to. Also, the crossfader on my z1 got hit so now IT doesn’t work so i’m thinking I may just have to scrap the whole setup and go for an S4 until DJTT restocks arcade buttons…
Try cleaning the buttons out again. Maybe some gunk has settled onto the contracts. Maybe even let the alcohol soak for a bit before blowing it out. I used to repair automotive computers and we used paint thinner to remove flux, but it melts plastic and I wouldn’t recommend it. Alcohol is safe to use on almost anything, but doesn’t dissolve stuff as well. It’s also impotent to use high pressure compressed air to really get the stuff out of there.
Swapping out arcade buttons is very easy (if I can do then a monkey can)… further down the list that VagabondZ linked are translucent buttons.
Are all the buttons screwed? If not try putting a working button on the position of a non-working button to see if it is the button rather than that part of the board that is screwed.