The Sinclair QL Forum

OK, looking at QLs after many years of never seeing one! I've received 3 (!) QLs from my parents' attic. Over the years they have had several roof leaks, unfortunately it seems the QL box got quite damp. Now, I haven't opened them up or powered them up yet so I could be stressing about nothing but there's evidence the box itself has seen water.

What to do? I have a two ideas:
1.) Plug them in and see what happens!
2.) Dismantle, clean with pure alcohol, dry out, reassemble then try

Anyone have better ideas?

You could always pop the tops off to have a look inside, but with old QL's that would usually destroy the brittle keyboard membranes (if they are still working) So you would have to order some new ones.

Hi,

after years of having been stored on the attic with heat in summer, the membranes are most probably gone anyways. I'd open them up, replace the membranes, remove and thoroughly clean the socketed ICs and sockets using alcohol.

It could easily be that some of the Cs on the PCBs didn't withstand the summer heat and time, but unlike the Spectrum that can really be damaged by switching it on with defective capacitors, the QL is not normally hurt further by that - It just won't work.

So after cleaning everything, check wether one of the boxes comes up with a F1/F2 prompt, and if yes, definitely replace the keyboard membrane.

Tobias

You are talking about the UK when you mention heat in summer?!

It may not get hot outside in the "fresh" air (assuming you your air is "fresh"), but the radiation of the sun can make roof spaces very hot, even in the UK.... Okay, maybe some years just southern parts of the UK.

But back to the water...

Pure water does not do any damage to the PCB or most of the components, as long as it does not stay wet. In practice, if the water is contaminated, and that contamination says behind when the water drys up... Or the water is present for a while, then the metal parts will start to corrode. Contamination and the byproducts of corrosion will form "partial" leakage "short circuits" that may mess up the signals. And heavily corroded PCB tracks will have gone open circuit.

But, if the computer was in the poly's and the roof leak was minor, there is a good chance that the water did not get into the QL case.

The only way to know if any / how much damage was done, is to open up the case and have a good look around.

I don't recommend just powering up to see... Not until the inside has been visually inspected.

Mark