Celius wrote:
Hi. I have a couple of famicom cartridges, and none of them have screws. I heard you can pry them open, but they'll probably crack. What's the safest way of going about this procedure? How are you supposed to open a famicart with no screws?
As others said, you gotta be super duper careful. The pirate carts are MUCH easier to open since they are of poorer construction, and the cart halves usually don't fit together too well. Real Fami carts though, on the other hand, are made very well and the tolerances are super tight on the plastic.
Anyways, it *IS* possible to do. Some brands are harder to open than others, due to construction differences. I noticed that some carts tho are glued or ultrasonically welded together (I'm looking at you, Namco). A few occasionally have a screw under the label near where the cart plugs in.
To open the 'Easier' carts, you need to grasp both halves of the cart and twist it, like opening an oreo kinda. If it's a cheaper cart, this will open it up without damaging anything. Note that it can take alot of force, and you should be able to see the halves separating some when you do it.
This won't be too effective on a well made cart however because there is a lip that runs around the edge of the casing and a fitting piece on the other half. This is the reason they are so hard to get open. This lip prevents the halves moving one way, while the tabs prevent it moving the other way. The end result is once it's snapped together, it will not want to come apart.
the next way to do it is to put the cart in a vice and very very very gently squeeze the bottom half of it a little bit (put something in the jaws so you don't mark your cart all up). This can move the plastic enough so you can get a screwdriver in there to pry it.
And, the thing about prying is, you NEVER pry up/down in the seam- the tabs hold fast and you're just going to end up breaking the tabs, marking the hell out of the edges, or breaking the case.
You need to get the screwdriver in to pry *outwards* to unlatch the tab. THEN the case will open up.
If you know where the tabs are, and can get the screwdriver or flat blade in there, you can then just unlatch it yourself and it will come free. Sometimes I put nails or small screws in the gap once a tab is unlatched- this prevents the tab grabbing again if you accidentally apply pressure to the two halves. All that work up to this point could be lost with the sound of <SNAP> as it locks back into place.