Restoration service w/examples

[Hobie-wan]

what would you charge for restoring controllers? i sometimes get some pretty funky ones in and wouldnt mind paying to have them cleaned up. oh and would you be interested in trades for your services?

Lemme know what you've got to be cleaned and we can hash something out. Since I haven't refurbed anyone else's stuff yet, I'm still trying to get a feel. If you've got something that interests me, barters are definitely welcome. I just got my scale yesterday so I can help figure out how much shipping will be back and forth. Shoot me a PM of what you've got that needs cleaning and some possible trade items and I'll try to come up with an estimate.

[Hobie-wan]

Just picked up a few games today, so I added some examples of removing those evil silver void stickers from rental places as well as safely cleaning stickers and gunk off an old glossy cardboard PS1 longbox. Edits in the top post.

[nielse16]

I just cleaned my NES controllers today and noticed that some of the rubber (?) pieces are hanging by a thread. Do you know a good place to buy replacements?

[Hobie-wan]

I came across a replacement rubber dome kit link sometime recently, but I can't find it again. All the controller's I've fixed were in pretty decent shape, or I swapped the rubber domes from controllers that were totally dead.

[jfe2]

I have an SNES controller that has damage to the rubber jacket on the cord where meets the controller. It just leaves the colored wires underneath exposed. I've used electrical tape in the past, but it eventually just comes off and leaves sticky gunk in its place. Is there a possible fix to this? I would imagine that the cord could be replaced. I'll take some pics tomorrow so you can get a better idea of where its damaged.

[Hobie-wan]

Yeah, electrical tape is a terrible fix on something that's going to be moved around. Its possible that the shell can be opened and feed some of the cord inside the controller to get past the exposed part since SNES cords don't have a stress relief that's part of the cord and has to secure at the shell edge.

If you look at my open pad shot, there are 3 posts to the left of the hole at the top, going toward the button holes. The cord snakes around those 3 to secure it. Just reroute the cord further in there and be careful when putting everything back together that you don't pinch anything and it should be fine, just a few inches shorter.

[greenthumb25]

you could open the case/shell and put a rubber stopper on the wire to prevent it from exposing the inner wires. tried electric tape before and was just a bad idea altogether.

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cleaning service mi

[SnowKitty]

Hobie-wan does some excellent work, the genesis he traded me was VERY clean, not a bit of dust anywhere. sorry for the blurry ass pic, but my camera sucks.

[XxBroBuzzxX]

I can't really ship anything to you but, how do I get crayon off of a SNES cart? I bought a Super Mario All-Stars that was in really bad shape with pink crayon all over it. How do I get most/all of it off? I tried using a magic eraser but it didn't get alot of it off.

[Hobie-wan]

Hmm I haven't used a magic eraser myself, but I know they're somewhat abrasive. If that didn't scrape it off that could be a big problem. Perhaps a layer of paper towel and a hair dryer to warm the crayon up and hope it sticks to the paper towel? I haven't had to remove crayon from anything. I have a junky cart shell, but no crayons.