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Guys, need some of your tips and tricks to maintain and improve a Parma controller.

Thanks

I have other types of controllers, but I need 4 Parma controllers for when people come over. I'm going with 35 ohm for the four driver stations.

Aloha Tony
My parma controllers are 25 ohm and to keep em "tuned" I diassemble it and place a piece of 220 grit sandpaper between the wiper arm and the resistor, pull the trigger a few times to smooth out the wiper and making it flat like we do our tires. When finished add a couple of drops of voodoo comm drops or similar comm drops to the resistor. Oil the pivot pin on the trigger, and to my liking I polish the trigger, where my finger touches it. Also you can remove the wire that goes to the metal frame and solder it to the wiper arm,cut it loose from the frame snake the wire under the trigger and up through the hole in the wiper arm and solder it, this way the power doesnt have to travel through the frame. The power directly goes to the wiper. If the resistor heats up (though it shouldnt) use an old school heat sink, ebayers sometime sell em.
Aloha
Marty

Thanks Marty. That is what I'm looking for. Hopefully we will get more creative tips.

If you want a really smooth controller remove the resistor from the frame and coat the wiped area with JB Weld epoxy. When the epoxy has set put a sheet of 400 grit sandpaper on a flat surface, turn the resistor face down and sand until the bands show. Besides making for a smooth feel this treatment will make it much less likely that the last band at the top speed end of the resistor will wear through, which is a common problem with Parma resistors.

Great tip Rich.

I'll post a quick photo sir, but right now I am swamped.

You can use your Dremel and cut away the side ribs exposing the resistor. Then you can use Marty's advice on using fine grit sandpaper to clean the contacts WITHOUT taking the whole controller apart.

With a little soldering and about $15 in parts, you can add adjustable sensitivity and braking to a parma. I recently did this with a 45 ohm parma, and it now has the ability to be switched to 35 and 25 ohm as well. If I didn't already own the 45 ohm controllers, I probably would have started with a 35 and dropped it down to about 27 and 20.

At the risk of cross posting, here is an old article on modifying the Parma Econo:

http://www.oldweirdherald.com/scalestuf ... oller.html

I have done this to a couple of controllers and I find that it's cheap and easy to do!

You can salvage that resistor, just solder the end of the last turn to the back of the full speed band.

Here is an article: http://home.comcast.net/~medanic/Tech-Parma.htm