Bringing My Atari 2600 Joysticks and Paddles Back to Life

I recently got back into retro hardware. My starting point was gaming, as I ordered one of the new Atari 7800s that plays the old cartridges. In my haste to grab a few games, I inadvertently purchased a complete 2600 with controllers. I’ll blame travel and lack of sleep for missing that detail. But it gave me the opportunity to attempt something I’ve never done before: restore the controllers.

# Assessing the condition.

The controllers that came with my purchase weren’t in the best shape. Both joysticks were missing their rubber grips. The fire buttons were okay, but not great. Most of the paint had worn away. These were well-used sticks.

On the positive side, I tested both and they worked well. That gave me hope.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

The paddles, on the other hand, looked decent aside from a minor scratch on one of the labels. Unlike the joysticks, however, they worked horribly. I remember the paddles always being a bit fiddly—but not this bad. Trying out Warlords, neither paddle moved smoothly, making the game nearly impossible to play.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

After watching a few restoration videos and finding replacement grips on eBay, I felt confident enough to tackle the project.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

# Taking apart the joysticks.

I started with the joysticks. The first order of business was to disassemble them so I could wash the cases. Although not horrible, the cases and cables were grimy.

This turned out to be the easiest part. A few screws later, I had both joysticks broken down.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

One thing I noticed while taking them apart was a plastic rim that the sticks come into contact with. On both controllers, the lip around the inner hole had broken. This was most likely from pushing the stick too hard in one direction—something not unusual if you’ve played Atari 2600 games. You can see the damage more clearly below.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

Since I removed the cords from their shells, I took a picture of the connector layout so I would know the order when reattaching them.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

This turned into a lesson. Although they came apart easily, I ran into connection issues after reassembly. If anything, don’t bother disconnecting the wires unless you absolutely need to. I could have easily cleaned everything with the boards still attached.

# Joystick cleaning incoming.

With them torn down, I cleaned each one with simple soap and water. I used a cloth to clean the cords and a toothbrush to get into the tighter spaces. Overall, it went really well. I ended up with two nice, clean sticks.

One thing I noticed was that each joystick had a number written on it. I was careful not to rub this off to preserve a little character. I’m sure millions of these were made and these are probably just inspection numbers, but to me it gives them some uniqueness.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

The boards themselves were in good shape. I checked the contacts and the dome switches were all fine. I decided not to do anything further with them.

# Tackling the paddles.

While those dried, I worked on tearing down the paddles. This required a bit more effort, as they have a few more parts to them. Sadly, I didn’t grab a full teardown photo, but you can find videos online that walk through it.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

Beyond cleaning, I also needed to refurbish the potentiometers. This meant carefully opening them up so I could access the internal contacts.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

My next step was to clean the gunk out of them. I used cotton swabs and isopropyl alcohol to remove the grime from inside. There was quite a bit of buildup from years of friction and dust.

Once done, I focused on the cases, cleaning them the same way I did the joysticks with simple soap, water, and elbow grease. With that complete, I reassembled everything.

# Making the joysticks look new.

With everything back together, there was one final thing to do. The paint on the joysticks had completely worn off.

I pulled out my wife’s acrylic paints and went to work finding a match. To my surprise, she had a set of acrylic paint markers. I found a bright orange that worked perfectly. After shaking them up, I got to work—and they turned out great.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

# A few problems before wrapping up.

As a first restoration project, I’m really happy with how everything turned out. They look fantastic, which was my primary concern. The paddles worked extremely well—better than I expected.

The joysticks, however, were a bit of an issue.

During reassembly, I discovered the internal connections are fairly fragile. They didn’t grip firmly when reattached. I ended up taking them apart multiple times trying to improve the connection. One attempt at crimping even broke a lead, so I decided not to push it further.

Lesson learned: if you don’t need to disconnect something, don’t.

Regardless, I’m extremely pleased with the restoration. They look good, work well, and fit nicely in my collection.

Atari 2600 Controller Restoration by Steven Reid, on Flickr

Hopefully the next hardware project goes just as well.