ANDREW.MERELIS.COM ----DECEMBER 2004-----> BACK TO MAIN MENU

01/24/05 Rebuilding my DVD Duplicator; Peter Hanging Paintings; Broken Heat; Monday Night at Aaron's: 


I've had this DVD duplicator for over a year and a half, and I've burned and printed literally thousands of DVD's with it. Recently, I've been getting an increasing amount of complaints about bad DVD's, and almost 30% of the DVD's I try to burn a re rejected as "Bad Disks." I've recently started hypothesizing that the DVD burner built into the robotic-arm machine was, itself, dying. And so, I figured out on the internet how to take the whole thing apart, and put in a new DVD drive, to hopefully make the machine work again for $109 rather than $1800.



First, I took the platic covers off, reveraling the electronic guts.


Then I removed the printing mechanism, which is one solid piece. I wasn't sure it was one solid piece, but luckily, I found a strategic set of screws to unscrew, and the whole mechanism with the robotic arm and inkjet attached to the print tray and its electronics came out together. I was relieved, because I was not looking forward to re-building the individual gears and other moving parts that would have been much more difficult to successfully put back togher. I can hack, but I'm no electrical mechanical engineer,.


This is the printing and picking mechanism.


What was left, was the DVD trive and two black plastic trays. Unfortunately, I had to also remove the two black plastic trays to access the screws that would let me remove the drive. It was at this step that I realised that I was actually taking the ENTIRE THING apart, to get down to the one part I wanted to replace. It was also here that I discovered that I had taken this machine apart enough that I was no longer sure I could get it back together again. I was willing, mind you, to pay thr $1800 if I had to BEFORE I began this operation. I figured I would do this because I had little to lose, as I was going to replace if anyway if this didn't work. Oh well.




After removing the two plastic pieces, I was finally able to unscrew the DVD drive from the metal base of the unit. I took this photo to remind myself later that the screw holes on the DVD drive line up with the front screw holes on the metal.

I was able to put the whole thing back together, and with a few careful and time consuming tweaks, the machine that I had fully dismantled actually came back to life. And I fancied myself having the same rush of adrenaline that I might have gotten working as a doctor in the ER. But I also know that I could never have that life. Too much stress. Too much is at stake. With electronics, there is no such thing as "unreplaceable." (Though with computers, lost DATA sometimes feels the same as a lost PERSON, but that's a whole other story.

Meanwhile, upstairs, Peter was doing precision surgery of a different kind....

Decoration:







As bother Peter and I worked, we both noticed that we were ever so slowly but surely getting colder, and colder, and colder.... it seemed on degree at a time.

I went up to the thermostat, turned it on and came back 30 minutes later...





Um.... The heat was dead. I called clive and he was there within a few hours to reset the heater, which eventually worked.

Tonight, I went to my weekly "Monday at Aarons!" I got to try on Erin's Ring!!! Fit like a glove.