I was so thrilled! I went to World of Commodore in 2007 and scored what appeared to be a MINT Amiga 2000 for only $50! I also picked up a few other items, including a triple kickstart switchable ROM. I opened it up to install the triple kickstart, and was dismayed when I saw this:
Yes, the DREADED leaking battery! If you have an Amiga and are reading this, I strongly advise you to check your own clock battery. This sucker was eating away at my motherboard! What a kick in the teeth, that was! So I got it out of there ASAP. I desoldered the ground pin, and broke it off the two + pins. I cleaned it up as best I could. Some damage had already been done, but thankfully, nothing serious:
Whew! Looks like I got it out of there just in the nick of time!
If you search the web, you'll get all kinds of advice on how to proceed. Essentially, what you want to do is to use something mild to clean up the leak without making things worse.
I wiped it up clean; it's time to determine which route I will take.
Different people have different solutions to this same problem. Some people will install a CR2032 battery with a diode; which is fine until CR2032's are obsolete! I wanted to retain the Amiga's ability to recharge a battery, while at the same time leaving the door open for future solutions. I wanted to get away from the motherboard; I want to be able to replace my battery without removing the drive bay, as well as eliminate any further risk of leakage. My priorities were:
Cost. I wanted this procedure to cost as little as possible.
Get the battery away from the motherboard.
Leave things open for easy, cheap replacement in the future.
It was suggested to me that I check out cordless phone battery replacements. I went into the Canadian version of RadioShack (The Source), and found this on clearance for $4.97:
It appears to be very similar to the original battery that I had removed! Since I plan on moving it away from the motherboard, I wasn't worried about it leaking. So I splurged; for $5, I had a replacement battery solution!
The first thing I did was to solder a couple of wires to the motherboard:
Okay, so I'm not the best solderer in the world. At least I got the job done. With any luck, this will be the last time I'll ever have to pull the motherboard out of this A2000.
Here's a shot topside; as you can see, I took this opportunity to upgrade the 68000 to a 68010 that I happened to have lying around my shop:
Yes, I know I used the same colour wire for both poles, which is lame. I confess; I got lazy and didn't feel like going out to the garage for a different colour wire. Just so you know, the one closest to the front of the machine is positive; the one closest to the processor (toward the back of the machine) is negative. I will get around to labelling these wires properly one day.
A better shot of the triple kickstart chip I installed:
Here's where I decided to locate the battery, out of harms way:
I left plenty of wire so that I can splice in a new battery many times if I need to, without getting anywhere near the motherboard.
All I need to worry about now is leaving the computer on for a few days straight so the battery can get a good charge. I hope this was of help to you!
