weber@brand.UUCP (Allan G. Weber) (03/12/86)
A friend of mine (who shall remain nameless) sent me the following instruction on how to make your own Mini-8 connectors for the serial ports of the Mac+. The more adventuresome out there may feel like giving it a try. I haven't tried doing it yet myself so don't send me any complaints/questions about the process. Allan Weber Weber%Brand@USC-ECL ...sdcrdcf!oberon!brand!weber ---------------------- For those of you who are cheap (extremely cheap) and daring, here's how I made an adapter to run my Password modem with the Mac Plus. 1. Cut the eraser off the top of a standard pencil. 2. Place the Mac face down on a table and hold the erase over the mini 8 connector on the back of the Mac.. 3. Stick 8 'sewing straight pins' through the erase and into the mini 8 connector on the back of the Mac. This will insure that the pins are in the correct places. 4. Remove the eraser an pins. 5. Cut the heads of the pins leaving 1/4" of pin sticking out the back of the eraser. 6. Take a 1/4+ inch long piece of drinking straw a slip it over the top of the eraser so that it is flush with bottom of the eraser and encloses the pins on top. The inside diameter of the straw will be too small to go over the eraser. To make it fit, place the straw over the end of a pair of scissors and force the scissors open to stretch the straw. If you then quickly slip the straw over the eraser, it will shrink to form a tight fit. 7. Now for the scary part. Re-insert the assembly into the back of the Mac and fill the straw with 5 minute epoxy. Be thinking of the story you will tell your local Apple Dealer to explain how a bunch of pins and a straw became glued inside the connector on the back of your Mac. Obviously if you do not have very steady hands, you could do serious damage to you machine. I had no problem, but proceed at your own risk. 8. Once the epoxy has set, remove the connector and file the back of the pins and the straw to make all the pins at the same level. You can also file the sharp ends of the pins to round the ends a bit. 9. Solder wires to the ends of each of the pins. There is not much room to do this, so start with the middle pins and work out. Despite what has been said on the net, it is not that difficult if you have a good soldering iron. 10. Place a second piece of straw over the connector and wires, and again fill it with epoxy to hold the wires permanently in place. 11. Attach you favorite DB-25 or other connector to other end. This actually makes a very nice adapter. It took about an hour to make, so you would have to be either very desperate or very cheap to want to go to all this trouble. I am/was both. ----------------------------