Thinkpads Forum

Just bought an external floppy caddy for the TP600 - flipped open the port cover flap thingy, and the #@*&£$ thing fell apart ...
A look around at my other TP600s shows that several other port flaps are past their sell-by date - so, is there a relatively easy halfway decent method of repairing 'em ? I'm not after perfection, just good enough to keep the dust out.

One thought was to try supergluing a strip of bicycle inner-tube on top of the flap - but thought I'd ask here first, just in case this problem was solved years ago ...

Colin

The only repair I've attempted on those flimsy rubber port covers is when the whole thing separates from the base of the system - just glue them back on. From your description, it sounds like the rubber has torn along the crease. In that case, your thought of bonding a strip of flexible (but tear-resistant) material to what's left sounds good. You may have to use something a little bit thinner than a tire inner tube however; plastic mesh from an old window/door screen could also work.

The other alternative would be to purchase a replacement cover from eBay. For example:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 0382225256

is a complete set of 600-series covers. Of course, given their age, some of these pieces may also be ready to fall apart.

rkawakami wrote:From your description, it sounds like the rubber has torn along the crease. In that case, your thought of bonding a strip of flexible (but tear-resistant) material to what's left sounds good. You may have to use something a little bit thinner than a tire inner tube however

Yes, that's right - hinge broke into 3 pieces. IBM's hinge rubber material is c. 0.5mm thick, and a bike inner tube is 1.0mm thick, so I've been looking around for other sources of thin rubber.

My favourite would be butyl rubber (as used to line ornamental fish ponds), and I've sent off for some samples - unfortunately 0.75mm is the thinnest available.

There is one other source of thin black rubber - and this morning I received some samples from a company who make garments for the rubber fetish community ... I only hope I don't get placed on some 'naughty knicker' mailing list as a result of asking for samples !

They kindly sent me 6" square samples of (4D brand) black latex rubber sheet in 0.5, 0.45, 0.4 and 0.33 mm thicknesses - enough to make a hundred hinges. The two thicker sizes feel about right, and I'll now experiment with various glues. The only downside with Latex is that it's not UV resistant and it might perish from contact with natural skin oils. Still, worth experimenting with - and I'll post results in due course.

I eventually settled for using pond liner, rather than the thinner 'naughty knicker' latex which is more prone to perishing - and opted for 0.7mm EPDM rather than the equivalent Butyl, as it felt slightly more flexible.
This sample was matt on both sides, and by trial and error found that Superglue was the most successful rubber-to-plastic adhesive, with a standard contact adhesive (Evostick) being used between the hinge and case.
Hardly invisible, but a tidy and acceptable repair - and still ok after 10 days of daily flexing.