TAC 2 Joystick Fix?

[christo930]

I have a couple of TAC 2 joysticks, one of which has a broken ball.  There's a steel shaft inside attached to the stick that ends in a metal ball. It's all one piece.  The steel shaft broke clean off and the ball is sitting in the hole.  Is there an easy fix besides welding the thing? I don't know how to weld, I don't have a welder and, I think it is pot metal and wouldn't weld very well anyhow.

The one that works is outstanding. It's my new favorite joystick.  I'd love to get the second one working well.

[Voxel]

Agreed, the Tac-2 is a great stick.  Worth fixing.

 

Brazing is an option,  you can pick up a couple of cheap blow torches and the brazing rods.  One torch is kept with the flame giving general heat, whilst the other is moved to focus the heat where you need it.  There are plenty of videos on youtube.

 

However you may prefer to glue and the best glue I could recommend is epoxy resin.  Whilst it's yucky and gets everywhere it should suffice and if the parts in question are metal then you can even cure it with heat (<150 degrees centigrade) for a superior hold.  Epoxy resin likes dry/clean/roughened mating surfaces.

 

I've used epoxy in many stressed joints with metal and they've so far lasted.

[christo930]

19 hours ago, Voxel said:

Agreed, the Tac-2 is a great stick.  Worth fixing.

 

Brazing is an option,  you can pick up a couple of cheap blow torches and the brazing rods.  One torch is kept with the flame giving general heat, whilst the other is moved to focus the heat where you need it.  There are plenty of videos on youtube.

 

However you may prefer to glue and the best glue I could recommend is epoxy resin.  Whilst it's yucky and gets everywhere it should suffice and if the parts in question are metal then you can even cure it with heat (<150 degrees centigrade) for a superior hold.  Epoxy resin likes dry/clean/roughened mating surfaces.

 

I've used epoxy in many stressed joints with metal and they've so far lasted.

I'll have to take it apart again and check, but if it didn't break off clean at the ball, I wonder if I could sleeve it and epoxy the sleeve.  By sleeve I mean a metal pipe (tube)  which could have both sides of the broken metal shoved inside and epoxied in that position.  That would probably work, but only if both ends have some meat to shove into the pipe/tube.

 

I watched a YT video of someone fixing the same problem, but they had better tools than me.  I'm thinking it would require a drill press to drill out the ball (the hole must be perfectly straight) and then shove a new shaft into the ball.