Switch Joycon

[Littlenose]

I picked up the Switch for the first time in ages to do some sofa gaming while trash is on telly.

The left Joycon stick seems to have become “sticky”. In the calibration screen left/right responds pefectly, but up/down seems floaty, sometimes responding perfectly, but mostly it wanders, and returns after a few seconds.

I’m wondering if this is a common occurrence, and what options are worth looking at?

1. Buy a new joycon
2. Find a replacement stick and fit it myself
3. Try opening up and use contact cleaner

Or any other options?

 

[sx_turbo]

I picked up the Switch for the first time in ages to do some sofa gaming while trash is on telly.

The left Joycon stick seems to have become “sticky”. In the calibration screen left/right responds pefectly, but up/down seems floaty, sometimes responding perfectly, but mostly it wanders, and returns after a few seconds.

I’m wondering if this is a common occurrence, and what options are worth looking at?

1. Buy a new joycon
2. Find a replacement stick and fit it myself
3. Try opening up and use contact cleaner

Or any other options?

this is a common issue,

Ifixit sell a repair kit with hall effect joystick, and the tool kit and a how to guide. I'd be fixing that myself

 

[Littlenose]

Cool, I’ll look into that, I’ve had if it stuff before for things and they were always decent

 

[snail1]

I think when this happened to ours we sent them back to Nintendo and they fixed it for free

Nintendo Customer Central

repair.nintendo.com

The disadvantage is you need to send it away, rather than fixing there and then.

 

[kakarott]

If you haven't opened it, send it to Nintendo

 

[Nemiyen]

Definitely send to Nintendo. I may have pushed my luck but I bought a few few pads to fix myself and then nintendo announced the repair scheme and over a few months I got them all repaired for free. I just used my Ebay purchase details and they were accepted.

The fault is inherent to the design so buying new or second hand, Nintendo are on the hook for the repair.

I may have been lucky though.

 

[Littlenose]

Oh wow, I'd not heard of that before... off to Nintendo with them it is

Out of interest, how long does it take for the repair process ?

 

[jklc]

I'd get it repaired if it is fairly new but if you want a quick fix you can spray contact cleaner into the analog stick between the rubber flap covers. Circle the sticks around a bunch of times and let it dry for an hour or more. Run the calibration again and hopefully it'll be good for a while.

I do this with my very old 1st gen console controllers every half a year or so. I keep telling myself Switch 2 is just around the corner so I never bothered to get new ones.

 

[Nemiyen]

Oh wow, I'd not heard of that before... off to Nintendo with them it is

Out of interest, how long does it take for the repair process ?

I can't honestly remember but if I said 2 or 3 weeks then I don't think I'd be far wrong. It never got long enough for me to worry about chasing them. In fact, I've just checked my emails and there's a fair few to check through but it looks like between me raising the order, getting a received email, confirm repair and then being returned to me confirmation was just shy of 3 weeks.

 

[Littlenose]

Thank you, that’s going to get it back running pretty quickly.

I did order a couple of Hall effect sticks on Thursday eve which are arriving today… do I send them back or have a repair (or maybe a junked) Joycon this weekend.

This is testing my ability for delayed gratification

 

[Nemiyen]

Thank you, that’s going to get it back running pretty quickly.

I did order a couple of Hall effect sticks on Thursday eve which are arriving today… do I send them back or have a repair (or maybe a junked) Joycon this weekend.

This is testing my ability for delayed gratification

I think the Nintendo repair WILL fail again at some point...but it should be free so worth doing. The hall effect ones I can't say about as I've not used any but I'm my experience, so far anyway, no 3rd party stuff beats the OEM versions.

 

[Littlenose]

I ended up fitting the replacement stick myself.

Took about 10 minutes and seems to work perfect so far, and I have a spare.

 

[Nemiyen]

I ended up fitting the replacement stick myself.

Took about 10 minutes and seems to work perfect so far, and I have a spare.

I forgot to say, the hall effect should last much, much longer than the normal ones that wear out. If they work as well as oem ones (no dead spots, slow reaction or over reaction etc) then they should be great.

N64 replacement sticks used to suck so bad. They're supposed to register plus or minus about 84 on each axis but 3rd party ones would go over 100, causing input issues and I'm sure on some games I remember it causing the head to clip through the body!

 

[Littlenose]

Yeah, I'm happy for £10 including 2 sticks and the tools required.

I've also heard good things about the "hall effect" type controls, but without opening them up to see the internals I've no way to determine for sure.