Help with a Torq-cut 22

Hi
I could really use a hand figuring out whats up with my machine, first a little history on machine, I bought it at auction about a year ago and it was running at the time, moved it into my shop. i didnt have time to hook it to power as i work out of state alot.
finally a couple months ago i got it all leveled out and powered it up turned it on and it powered up just fine, still haven't really used it much just turn it on from time to time and dry run a program.
yesterday i went to turn it on and its not booting up right

this is the first screen it gives me



i hit f1 and it promps me to enter a password but it won't let me type anything, if i hit enter of esc it puts an x and asks for a password again it does this twice







tell switching screens



after a minute or so it shows this



again i hit f1 and get this



from there it wont let me do anything

i checked the harddrive and it feels like its running, the battery on the mother board has some crusty white stuff growing on it, kinda thinking that has something to do with it?

again any help would be greatly appreciated
Thank you
Chris

That vintage has a NiCad rechargable battery for the CMOS. If you see corrosion on the battery then it is leaking and will damage the CPU traces if it hasn't already.

The BIOS should not have a password unless the previous owner set one. Are you using and external keyboard or are you trying to use the CNC keyboard? I don't believe the CNC keyboard will access the CMOS properly. You may have two open keyboard connector on the back, if you do you need to plug the external keyboard into one and move the cable from it's current location to the other open one. See if this gets you past the password by entering nothing but ENTER at the prompt.

If there is a password there may be a back door reset to clear it but you will have to get the information off the motherboard to verify if it has that capability.

The harddrive failures are most likely due to the corrupt CMOS. You need to address this first.

Even if you get proper access to the BIOS settings you will need to get that battery out of there which will require desoldering and soldering.

thank you for the reply, ill remove the mother board and replace the battery and loo to see if there is another key board plug

Double checked and the chemistry on the last Bridgeport I did was NiMH not NiCd. I think this is where I got the last one 3/V60R Type Computer Memory Battery | 141-102

Verify the part number on yours.

thank you again, has anyone ever just replaced it with a battery holder? so replacement of battery isn't such a hassle?

mine is a ni/cd, could i replace it with a 3 aaa battery pack and use nicd rechargeable the volts would be the same but the mah would be higher not sure if that would hurt anything

I had an ezpath with the same or similar control and had the same problem. The initial solution was an AA battery pack and some soldering. It lasted for a while and then completely died - had a new motherboard/passive backplane installed (from EMI if i remember correctly). Long term you will probably want to get familiar with them (EMI).

It looks like you have already de-soldered it so putting in a three cell pack from a cordless phone should work just fine. Most of them have leads and a small connector. Just cut off the connector and solder the leads into your board. Make sure you get the plus and minus right or you will have big problems.

Once you have it back together, you will have to go into the CMOS setup on the computer and set the date and time, drive types, amount of memory, etc. Most newer PCs set this stuff automatically, but the old ones didn't. The hard drive type may be written down somewhere, but if not, you will have to get the specs from the label on the drive or look up the model number on the net. Then scroll through the list of types in the bios until you find the one with the same number of heads, tracks, sectors, ... If there is no exact match, there should be a "user" type where you can enter these parameters. If you get this wrong, the computer will not be able to read the drive. If the parameters are close, it may corrupt the drive if the PC writes to it. While you have the PC apart, it would be a good time to put the drive in a USB enclosure, hook it to another PC as an external and make a backup of it.

If you are not familiar with vintage PCs, it might be wise to find someone who is and ask for help. Its not like you can just slap in a new Dell with Windows 8 and be running again.

Jerry

i picked up a 3 aaa battery pack at radio shack and 3 ni/ca rechargeable aaa's, I'm going to solder wires in to board with a plug on one end and wire a plug to the battery pack so i can mount it in a easy to reach spot

any tips on what to use for cleaning the acid off the board?
i ordered an adapter for the hard drive so i can make a back up

ok well now onto another problem, put it all back together and know the monitor show nothing as a blinking yellow instead of green, and all the lock indicator lights on key board are on and won't turn off?
anyone got any ideas on this one?
i was thinking the video card but the key board plugs directly into other board

I'd just call EMI on Monday. They have all the replacement boards in stock, including motherboards. Plus, you'll get the latest / last version of the software. Buy an hour of tech time / phone support too and get the parameter settings reviewed, especially good for making sure rigid tapping is in sync. We have a 1996 TC-22 in our shop and EMI has been great for supporting it.

Can you post some pictures of what you did? It sounds like the PC isn't starting up. Are you sure everything is connected?

Jerry

I've looked over it a dozen times to be sure i didn't miss anything, the only thing im on sure of is the 2 wire plug on the very bottom left side for the spindle control (i took a picture of it but then i most have deleted it on accident while deleting some other pics) but i wouldn't think that would effect the computer coming on

I can't see anything wrong from the pictures, but I have never seen a cable that long on a battery pack. I would probably disconnect it and see if it goes back to bringing up the error messages. You shouldn't need a battery for the PC to start, it just won't keep its settings and clock.

I would also try powering up with nothing in the motherboard except the video card to see if that does anything. If it does then add things one at a time to see what happens. I don't know how these are set up in a bridgeport, but a PC would probably have a speaker, a reset switch, a power LED, etc attached with small twisted wires. Did this have anything like that?

Does the motherboard have a MFG and model number on it so you can look online for a manual?

Jerry

i tried with out the battery hooked up and still nothing, i will try unhooking everything and try again

Did you resolve your problem?

manta said:

i tried with out the battery hooked up and still nothing, i will try unhooking everything and try again

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Hi did you resolve your problem, I have the exact problem as you, if you do, could you help me, my email is [email protected]