from looking at all the various ways these drives fail I rekon the best thing is to remove them all from the machines, store them flat, with the platter facing up and just let them unsdisturbed until needed.

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when the time comes to use them, some time in the future, open them, check for liquefied rubber and remove/replace if possible. the rubber going bad should do no damage if the drive is not used...its only if the drive is turned on that the bad rubber will kil it.

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a kind of cryostasis for a hard drive. Thinking also about opening them up now, moving the heads/armature to the outside edge of the platter and lifting the heads of the platters with a small piece of plastic or something to avoid stiction ...which will happen if they are just left as they are. What about placing a piece of paper between the head and platter and then lowering the head back down again?... good/bad idea?

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uniserver, your process of removing the rubber seems best for my skillset, as I have never been able to get the heads off the platter safely ..........the thing is, for those drives with the rubber stop under the platter , if that is not replaced the head will crash into the spindal, but it can be controlled by the rubbers under the magnets. That's my understanding of it anyway.

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so that's a plan people...........store them all........and switch over to sca80.

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delighted with the 2 sca80 I have working....have allot more confidence in their lifespan

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great stuff.............its all good fun