Archived cards, M600 reader now out of adjustment and misfeeding, but M1000 reader nearly ready to take over

 OVER 1/3 THROUGH THE ARCHIVING OF 145,000+ CARDS

I have completed five of the 15 trays of system cards and archived about a quarter of tray 6. Further, I continue to read and save the COMMON submitted decks and soon will start on some IBM distribution boxes and programs used by the prior owner to operate his business.

M600 CARD READER BEGINS CLANKING AND MISFEEDING

I will hear some clanks and metallic sounds on certain feed attempts. The reader is also failing to pick cards much more than before. The troubleshooting guide suggests that this sound is either misadjustment or wear in the parts that accomplish the pick/feed. 

There is a series of adjustments that I will have to put the mechanism through in order to have it properly set up. If there is wear, for example in a bearing, I will learn that as well during the process ahead. Until this is done, the main reader I was using and its external interface are unusable.

M1000 CARD READER GETTING CLOSER TO FULL OPERATION

The magnetic pickup is again reading as fully connected and functional. The oscilloscope shows good clean pulses being detected and the reader logic is working properly. I finished installing the internal interface and connected it to my laptop to test reading some cards.

The problem I am encountering now is random Read Check errors. The data that is showing often has dozens of columns apparently laced with holes, although the actual cards are not punched like that. If light is detected and times when the card should not be over one of the 80 columns, or dark is seen when the card should be past the read station, the Read Check error is triggered.

This could be caused by sporadic circuit continuity problems with the magnetic pickup, if that causes the logic to miscount and believe the card is already past column 80 when it is physically still in mid stride. It could also be a different error that I have not yet found and debugged. 

Still, the pick mechanism and feeding seem really healthy. If I can resolve the erroneous read errors and its root cause, I will be ready to archive more cards with the new reader.