[weblacky]

Yo,
Last summer I was lucky enough to snag three decked out Dual CPU (300 or 400Mhz, forget right now) Octanes that used to be used for some kind of digital video work.  All Octanes have Odyssey graphics of some kind (full boards), SD-IO cards, and higher-end networking.  The Octanes need work and have missing/smashed plastic carrier knobs.

Now of course the guy I bought them from was a recycler, so a bunch of dumb*sses had screwed with them between the original owner and when I went to inspect and offer for them.  The issue on most of them Octanes is, these dumb*sses (I'll say it one more time) pulled the entire graphics set along with SD-IO video capture (no webcam port) and a Fibre card out of the machines to "lookey at this".  Then shoved them back in, wrongly: 

1. one of the carriers was upside down, in place.
2. one wasn't placed in the bottom track correctly then forced 3/4 in (seized) that bent/scraped or pulled many of the caps nearly off the fibre board when it impacted the sidewall, luckily the cap legs held to the board and the caps themselves pulled away from their legs, so no obvious pad damage.  I have new matching OSCON caps ready to install on that XIO Fibre board.
3. One was just fine, but had a dead "click of death" PSU, swapped it out to boot it.

I paid up on the "just fine" one and massively low-balled on the screwed-with ones (so I ended up with them all).  So I'm trying to get the screwed-up ones back in good order (since I have less money into them).  I know one of screwed with one's boots, unknown about the other.

Mix of old and new green skin logo designs.

So this issue is the XIO carriers, I've only done the basic looking and reseating kind of stuff.  Nearly ALL the XIO carriers will not make contact and seat (either at all or very easily).  The only one I have gotten seated took 6 attempts and a lot of force, I mean a lot.  Most of them will go in (past the pin locks) and just about 1/4" to being seated...they seize.  Looking with a flashlight, I don't see any damage, obstructions, track debris, etc..  I've not yet tried to "grease" the track/carrier rim with a plastic-safe teflon grease.  The carriers have indicators of which is slot A and what's considered "UP".  So I doubt I can mess that up.  But I'm having nothing but failures trying to physically insert the carriers.  I've not even tried to remove the mainboard carriers for fear of the same thing.  But I need to clean & fix these for later resale.

I've tied holding down the latch pin on the carrier (spring loaded things) while inserting, I've tried not doing that.  I've tried letting the moving back bar stay pulled out, I've tried with it already pushed into the carrier, I've tried lifting/dipping/jiggling the assembly just before it would seat.  I've tried bare strength (to a point) and lastly I've also tried yelling at them.

All techniques resulted in the same outcome.  The board will slide, until about 1/4" or so of being seated and then seize.  Hard to get back out, impossible to go further.  It's made harder because most are missing their plastic knob handles...so ouch...my hands.

Ok, so thoughts?  Compression connectors (on both sides) look fine (no scratches or damage), the assembly that retracts and releases the "hooks" near all the board's compression connectors operate fine when the board is outside the system.  Very well in fact, I didn't think they needed any lubrication.  I see the alignment pins and the horizontal bars the latches are supposed to connect with inside the Octane bodies, they look undamaged to me.

Any suggestions?  

Or are these just so poorly designed that you need a towel/pad and to turn the station on its face and slide the carriers in while constantly tapping/vibrating/jiggling the carrier to try to get it to seat right.

What's the trick here, I've read the manual...no hints there.

I will eventually take these apart for cleaning and inspection/rebuilding.  I'd like to be able to do a test boot attempt before I start fiddling with the insides.

Thanks for any suggestions you can provide.

[Raion]

I wouldn't lubricate the track except with something thick like silicone paste. You don't want anything that's going to attract dirt or that's going to possibly drip off on to the connectors.

personally I think that the first thing you should do is take apart the machines entirely to make sure that the hooks for the frontplane aren't bent.

To do this remove both the motherboard and graphics modules, and then the power supply and front skin.

You will then have a bunch of captive screws on the front to remove. The drive cage and front plane will then come out as a unit.

Inspect carefully and possibly try hooking them in right there on the system to make sure that there isn't damage, and then you should be able to get a better look at the rails and see how the graphics unit is sliding into place.

For what I would recommend, look up 3M Silicone Paste. I would brush it onto the guides, not on the carrier. Wipe off the excess and run it through the carrier a couple of times and wipe off any excess that you missed.

Then reassemble the system carefully.

[hamei]

Or are these just so poorly designed that you need a towel/pad and to turn the station on its face and slide the carriers in while constantly tapping/vibrating/jiggling the carrier to try to get it to seat right.

No, they aren't poorly designed. The cards slide in and out nicely and latch very well, no grease needed or desired.

Your frames or housing or both are bent.

Didn't you mention something about the gorillas in the Samsonite ad earlier ?  :(

Going to have to take it apart, I fear .....

[weblacky]

Yeah....I put small (surface) amount of teflon grease on the plastic rail. Slides much better now, but last 1/4" - seized. Something is not working right..I get the whole Xbow removal and fitment thing. I just don't want to do it now, I might purchase another Xbow on eBay and check with that. I think these are all older Xbows anyway.

Well maybe I'll change my tune when I have the space to actually dismantle this thing, I'm putting up shelving this weekend (hopefully) that my SGIs and vintage hardware will go on. That should clean out project table space for an Octane disassembly.

Thanks.

[bjames]

The ixo boards on my octane were very sticky when removing and reinstalling. I just used a small amount of Vaseline on the rails top and bottom, now they slide very easily. Also added Vaseline tp the drive sleds as one was so hard to removed, the plastic handle broke off. Since replaced it, lubed up and never had any issues with sticky drive sleds.