IBM Model F 3178 C2 repair-ish

[schwi]

(I titled it "repair-ish" because it wasn't much more than a wash aha)

I bought this 3178 off ebay for $120 + shipping. What I suppose is a pretty fair price.

This is how I received it.


sellers photos as well (in about 144p, I suppose.)
(also has the solenoid! epic!)

The bottom left screw mount was broken off (however still attached to the screw), some flippers have been fucked over, and most unfortunately for me the spacebar was broken.


I had ordered flippers in advanced from ellipse - so when I got the board I got straight to taking it fully apart for a wash and to replace the flippers. (in the kitchen, lol) Thankfully, the foam is still good!


And wow, IBM plastic really is something else. All I've really done is wipe it down the case with soap and water and let the keycaps soak in dish soap water. I didn't even wipe down the keycaps. The case has some scuffs in it - but I'm not too picky about that I suppose.

Spoiler:

I dug in the garage for glue. I found some stuff that claimed to bond - but that didn't work lol. That's what the residue is. But after that, i got plastic JB Weld and made a mess. Sorry guys, i've never done this before.


anyways, after that, the screw wouldn't fit in all the way, but using my IQ of about 32 i came up with the idea of creating a washer out of a twist tie to fill the gap between the case and the scew so it'd stay together. And it worked!



I got to see the thing fully together for the first time and wow. It's gorgeous. After the shit it's given me, I've kind of grown attached to it as well.

Well before I got this myself, I had the idea of blue keys on a blue button. I also took note of the "A,a / A" switch and took opportunity of this. So I handed over all the money I had really and bought myself some keycaps from Unicomp. And well, It's just magnificent. I'm so happy with it. (missed opportunity to print all the caps with "a", I couldn't afford it aha.)

(yes - the layout is intentionally not a standard layout. fight me about it.)

Here's some more photos of it alongside my $50 M122

It might not be everyone's taste, but I'm taking this board to my grave so I couldn't care less, I suppose.

The last thing I need to do is find a new spacebar for the thing. And I suppose buy a converter. But no one sells F XT spacebars and converting it is too expensive for me right now..

Hopefully it's okay for me to post this as a thread - I'm not too sure if this is worthy of one but I guess I thought I'd give it a shot or something I suppose.

a.

[karlmartin95]

People should appreciate more this Model F variant, for me is one of the best. It has a solenoid included, a good layout and it's sexy. I have two of them, one restored, it's quite a job to make it work but with the new Pandrew's board you can adapt it very easy.

Good restoration, enjoy your new board! One of the best.

[jmaynard]

I've got one of these coming, and an xwhatsit universal controller for it...hoping it comes up and runs fine.

[schwi]

People should appreciate more this Model F variant, for me is one of the best. It has a solenoid included, a good layout and it's sexy. I have two of them, one restored, it's quite a job to make it work but with the new Pandrew's board you can adapt it very easy.

Good restoration, enjoy your new board! One of the best.

Yeah, I really love this variant. The blue button as well is so cute. Thank you!

I've got one of these coming, and an xwhatsit universal controller for it...hoping it comes up and runs fine.

Ohh awesome! Hope it arrives and runs all good!!

[darkcruix]

People should appreciate more this Model F variant, for me is one of the best. It has a solenoid included, a good layout and it's sexy. I have two of them, one restored, it's quite a job to make it work but with the new Pandrew's board you can adapt it very easy.

Good restoration, enjoy your new board! One of the best.

Yeah, I really love this variant. The blue button as well is so cute. Thank you!

I've got one of these coming, and an xwhatsit universal controller for it...hoping it comes up and runs fine.

Ohh awesome! Hope it arrives and runs all good!!

I have seen that someone has used the switch to turn the solenoid on or off. If anybody has a guide on how to do this, I would be interested

[jmaynard]

I have seen that someone has used the switch to turn the solenoid on or off. If anybody has a guide on how to do this, I would be interested

In the original environment, the bottom right hand key of the cluster of 8 on the left hand side enabled and disabled the solenoid. Probably better to emulate that functionality, unless you need the key for something else.

[jmaynard]

Mine came in today. Nice and clean - well, as clean as a used keyboard ever is - and no need to new foam, since this one was a late production version with neoprene. I'll post pictures tomorrow sometime, most likely.

[schwi]

Mine came in today. Nice and clean - well, as clean as a used keyboard ever is - and no need to new foam, since this one was a late production version with neoprene. I'll post pictures tomorrow sometime, most likely.

happy to hear! excited to see it.

[walterhall]

Love these things.
slope game