Musical Fidelity Chassis Hardware... Type of Screw?

Archived from groups: rec.audio.tech (More info?)

On 14 Sep 2005 14:27:16 -0700, spampup@aol.com wrote:

>Hi, All,
>
>I recently purchased a used Musical Fidelity Tri-Vista 21 DAC (eBay).
>Works great, but...
>
>The previous owner apparently had removed (or TRIED to remove) the top
>cover, which is held in place by 14 black hex-head (allen) screws.
>
>The hex sockets on about half the screws are stripped, so a 2mm allen
>wrench will not grip the socket at all. The screws are ugly, with shiny
>silver showing, and I'd like to replace them for cosmetic reasons!

While this won't help for service reasons, perhaps you could do
some touch-up painting? Or would this still not look good because the
sockets are gouged out?

>I believe I will be able to remove the stripped screws if I purchase an
>extractor (sold by Stewart-MacDonald) designed to remove stripped allen
>screws on electric guitars.
>
>(Any suggestions on alternative methods of extracting stripped allen
>screws?? Without Drilling?!?)

I've used a Dremel with a cutoff wheel to put flat-head slots in
the spline or whatever screw heads with the raised part in the middle,
used on hard disk drives so I can take them apart (to disassemble dead
ones, not in attemps to fix them). If you feel confident enough not to
hit the metal the screw is holding on, you can put a slot in them that
way. For something 'valuable' I'd use this method before I tried
drilling, OTOH I've had enough experience with a cutoff wheel on screw
heads to feel confident.

How about this offer: Send it to me and I'll carefully remove these
screws for you, and send it back. I'll take my time, it could take a
couple of days (or even a month or so, depending on how good this
thing sounds).

>Anyway, what I need to know is exactly what kind of screws to order as
>replacements. From surfing the 'net I believe the screws are called
>"button head socket cap" screws, but I don't know what size. The screw
>heads are 5mm across, with 2mm hex sockets. The threaded part is about
>6mm long with a fine thread.

You probably need to know more than "fine thread", you surely need
to know threads per inch. Oops, you're talking mm, you need to know
threads per something else.

>Does anyone know what this could be? "M3"? Anyone happen to know what
>type of screw Musical Fidelity uses?

Dunno, but perhaps http://www.smallparts.com and
http://www.mcmaster.com would have the screws.

>Thanks a bunch in advance for any advice!
>
>Ken