I'm not a
'Qbus person', much prefering Unibus machines, but IIRC one of
 the ST506/RX50 controllers (RQDX1 I think) had to be the last device on
 the bus since it didn't pass on grants. If that's the controller you
 have, then the RXV21 would mever get BGs or NPGs and woul;d probably do
 what you're seeing. Try putting the RXV21 first... 
 Especially since the boot ROMs pull the boot sector off the floppy
 without interrupts. You should see some activity, hear heads, 
 
Err, yes, but data transfer on the RXV21 always used DMA (NPR/NPG
signals). If the RXV21 never sees a non-processor grant, it'll never
transfer any data.
-tony