Over the last 45 years of service in the Electronics Industry, I have worked on anything from Coffee Pots, Rice cookers, VCR’s, Camcorders, Digital Betacam, and then Transmitters in the AM and FM Radio business.  There is a lot to see. But in working on consumer tape decks and amplifiers there are a few things that stick out for anyone wishing to repair electronics should watch out for.

They can be things like poor wave soldering of the boards. There is so little solder on these parts that the smallest bump or vibration will cause a failure of that circuit. Multiply this by 100- 200 joints in a machine and you have a real good chance that it will need repair sooner rather than later. Other things that can break weak joints are conditions of thermal cycling. Does the part have a heat sink on it or does it get hot? Well so does the joint. So many cycles will make the solder joint weak and it was develop a ring around the part lead and again an intermittent connection or break. Corrections done by a good Technician who knows how to solder using Kester 44 (Lead) solder will do wonders for the longevity of the unit.

That is not the only thing that causes failure. There is the infamous 10 V Electrolytic capacitor. These 10 V types have proven a very high failure part so that I often tell others that I am allergic to 10 V caps. Many a tape deck or other equipment that have this part are on borrowed time from when they are made. I just was working on a Teac Z6000 tape deck. Playback was lost on the left channel. Further examination indicated that the coupling cap was defective and must have had a bad connection inside. What value was it? 220uFd/ 10V. Not the type of part I would expect in a $1500 tape deck. Don’t feel bad Teac, Revox and Uher have their Frako caps too. They are notorious for shorting.

7/18/16

OK, Now for the X series tape decks from Teac. Some think that having dual capstan drive is a plus. Technicians can tell you what a headache they can be. There is sensitivity to belt length, belt position, how clean the pinch rollers are and dirt on the capstan shaft. However, what causes me to write this is that I have also found the the two conditions that are seen are either Skew or tape looping. Looping is when the tape comes away from the heads making a perfect loop down below them. This is most likely caused by a loose belt. Most all X series need a 16.8″ belt but some sell 17″ belts that are near the limit to not use them. They sometimes do not work and if they do only for 6 month. Marrs has the good belts at 16.8″ X .330″ wide.

Next there is Skew. This is when the tape travels off the straight path at the pinch roller. I have determined recently that some genius adjusted the head position on the head block so that they are tilted and THIS make the tape skew. Of course the machine never works like they adjust them. Just go turning all the head screw and you are sure to make the deck better- Yes after about $160 of Technicians work. Rule is don’t touch these screws you need a lot to put them back into position.. Please,I have more than enough work already.

The best Service Manuals come from Stereomanuals.com .  If I do not have one I need that is where I get them!

In Canada, A new site for service in your area may be this one here. http://reeltoreeltech.com/

Give them a call and see if they can help you. Tel: 604-514-1751  Talk to Curt.     Email: info@reeltoreeltech.com

This product is used to dampen the movement of left tension arms in Teac and other tape decks. Its Viscosity is 300,000 cSt.  The 8mL sized bottle should be enough to do 3-5 tension arms per bottle. As you probably already know this product is not easy to find. The product name is Dimethyl Polysiloxane. I offer this as a service to my fellow Service Technicians who can not afford to buy a Gallon of it for over $400.

I have used it successfully on a number of decks already. It does work.

Cost is $8.00 plus $7.15 shipping.

Contact me at skywavebe@sbcglobal.net to order one or a couple bottles.

They are in limited numbers.

They are clear after the bubbles rise. Probably can service 10-20 machines from one bottle.

One of the most aggravating things is to fast wind a X7R and have to wait the 2.5 to 3 minutes to have it finish a 1800 foot roll of tape.  Ha! Teac knew there was a problem and  released technical bulletins to make some corrections. Well I use a different approach in application of the 30Vdc supply to the motors only in fast wind mode. Does this work you might say? Well both fast winds with my modification finished the same roll of tape at 58 seconds. I have taken a signal out of the logic that signals the reel motor drive that it is doing fast wind mode. This then goes through some resistors and transistors to invert the signal to drive a TIP107 transistor that then sends the higher voltage to the motors. There is a diode that maintains the 14Vdc supply at play mode on those motors and that prevents the feed of the 30 Vdc supply back to the 14Vdc supply. I have tested this deck and it is going through more tests but if you want to get your deck corrected for this problem, contact me.

Well the first of my mods is out there and only time will tell if the client likes it. I have a feeling that anyone who has sat through the slow wind speeds will fine this less than a minute speed much better. I have obtained some further parts to build these kits. I just have to do the  schematic and instructions. I think the idea will be well received once people find out how well these decks can work.

I seem to get posts that are ridiculous as to subject matter. There are Viagra sales attempts, T shirts or Jerseys, Shoes, Health plans and diets and then the Porn stuff that is trashed immediately- even if it is in your user name.

This site is about tape deck repairs and if you can not figure that out I just told you. If you attach links or URL that go nowhere the post will be trashed. If you think that a URL to Chinese or other language that I can not hope to ever understand, that is trashed.

Why not save yourself a bunch of frivolous typing and stop wasting time.

It does not take me long to trash a post.

Today I trashed 86 posts- there are still a bunch of stupid people posting junk to the blog. They are all gone now: Jakarta Security if you business is that poor that you have to look for client here?

As soon as I see ZUNE the post goes. This is NOT about those devices.  WE are not selling Jerseys here either- they are immediately deleted.

There is a reason I do not type in Spanish, Russian, Chinese nor Klingon. I can not read it so it gets trashed.

These items listed  here are ready to be sold. Not every one will be a Mint as these are older units and often times rescued from adverse locations. Many of them are very acceptable and the pictures here are of the actual units. More units will come available as they are finished.

Pioneer CTF-700 $300.00  Shipping is extra. If interested or if you have questions, E mail skywavebe@sbcglobal.net

This unit was sold and I have not been good as listing things here as there is no time for it but there are other units to sell. I have two NAD 6300 units to be sold too. A few open reels decks too.

I keep on getting comments on how people want a blog like the one here that I put up. Well, it is not that hard to do and it is very affordable. This link here will get you to the trial one month evaluation. Actually for the quality of the product they deliver and at a terrific price it is a no-brainer.

I highly suggest that you look into this and not pay some SEO person hundreds of dollars to make you a different site. You found me didn’t you?

https://www.1and1.com/1and1principles-hosting

Tell them I sent you (467419039)

I have been working on units a log time and some of the time I get requests for help that I do not have manuals for so over to Hi Fi Engine I went. Most of the time  I was able to help the other guy for no cost. Well most recently I was working on a  Sony 854-4 where I got the manual from Hi Fi Engine. The schematic is so bad that you can not see what the part numbers are- what idiot scans stuff like this and what further idiot puts in on a site for some poor person to download and try to work with.

Well I made a comment to them about the poor quality and now I am done with their poor scans and idiotic behavior. Why don’t they come up to standards rather then kick people out from downloading their garbage.

No matter, I am not going there anymore and do not suggest to anyone that you do either. If I can not fix a product with all my experience and their blurry manuals what makes you think that a person just starting is going to be able to.

Get all you manuals in paper from Stereomanuals.com

This place will get you a good and clear product.  http://www.stereomanuals.com/index.htm

Hi FI Engine Quality-JUNK!

For a time there has been a lack of good service facilities for the repair of tape decks but in time some of them have come out of the woodwork to make themselves know. This is a list of the ones I know do good work.

Not everyone is perfect and I even get complaints due to wait time.  But on a whole these places  99% of the time will fix your unit well.

In The Pacific Northwest: Curt Palme       http://reeltoreeltech.com/    Email: info@reeltoreeltech.com  604-514-1751

Sound Solutions Inc                                                                                   #344-19567 Fraser Hwy                                                                                  Surrey BC  V3S9A4

New Jersey Factory Service, Inc.
16 Chestnut Avenue Suite 103 B
Emerson,New Jersey 07630
201-967-0060
Mon- Wed 8-4   Thurs 8-2 Closed Fri  Sat/Sun by appt.
www.njfactoryservice.com    Analog/Digital Audio Repair

Tom Brucker

Hi Tech Service
2934 Nolensville Pk.
Nashville, TN 37211
615-331-9241

Crown repairs ,Chuck Ziska   Ocala,Fl.  352-861-1052   ocalazman@embarqmail.com

For those of you with expensive portable equipment or even flashlight like Mag-lites. One of the worse things you can put into a device is an Alkaline battery. They are destructive and leak every time. They could be considered hazardous material the way they destroy electronics by their leaking and corrosive fluids. I am surprised that the EPA has not outlawed these terrible junk batteries and there are many better choices that will cost you less in the long run. I suggest you get Tenergy NMH or Nickel Metal Hydride batteries that may cost more initially but when you can use them 1000 times there is not a lot to figure out that they are worth a pile of money saved. I even have some AA cells from 2001 that still work. The important part though is that the DO NOT LEAK. Abandon the purchase of junk Alkaline batteries, save money and your equipment too. Head over to All-battery and buy the Tenergy product like I do and no more trouble. No I do not own or work at ALL-battery. I just have had very good luck buying their product and not one failure yet- 9V all the way to AAA and they have rechargeable 123A batteries too. Here is to make it easy for you-

http://www.all-battery.com/ni-mhbatteries.aspx

Each billing cycle I have to go around in circles wasting a lot of time to get Dish to get to the amounts of billing their last agent promised. They make promises and then do not follow them. Direct TV is no better and probably worse now that incompetent AT&T owns them. I have good stories about them too.

I suggest you get a Roku box and Netflix and do away with all the Morons and idiots not to mention liars at DISH Network. They charge you all this money and still have commercials in the programming- that is all crap. You can get that from free by watching METV.

Comment with your experience. I wish Satellite would go away.

For those that are not informed and have to way to measure wow and flutter as well as phase shift with a scope, I am posting this so that you DO NOT waste your money on this garbage.

I finally tested a set here and had to wonder what was the problem with the freshly oiled and belted deck and it was the Pinch Rollers. These Pinch roller push ons are a bad attempt to make a product but if they did any testing they would find that they exhibit cyclic wow and flutter rising to .14% and that they are not very precise in that the azimuth sing wave shifts consistently at least 90 degrees each way. This is ridiculous that these are still being sold. I looked on Amazon and there are two 5 start rating reviews.

In putting on another pair of old rollers I had here the wow and flutter went down to .040% wrms and stayed there.

This is another rip off product to be sold to those that do not know better- my results have been confirmed by two other Technicians.

I continue to get calls that people want me to work on their dual well cassette decks. These usually sold for around $150. Doesn’t that tell you how they are made?

Suffice it to say that these decks of questionable quality in the first place run about $400 to repair as there are two separate transports to tear down and rebuild. Is is worth it? Certainly NOT!   They were considered throw away when they were made many years ago. The target audience was the 16 year old high school girl- does that tell you anything about the quality and their purpose?

If you have a broken one of any brand that is dual cassette, you are far better off getting an older solid made single deck like a Teac C-3RX or a Tascam 122 Mk II. Nakamichi BX300 is also another good product. You can’t buy a piece of junk and expect the Technician to make a piece of gold out of it- I have worked on them enough years that I know this is not going to happen.

Out of all the dual cassette decks made there was only one worthy one made and it was a Sony ES model that cost over $1000. That might be fixed.

Recently I have been working on some decks here that have been badly butchered by local shops or so called Tecnicians that should really be called idiots because of what they do to these machines-

What has been observed are things like-

Broken off screws due to a drill being used to screw them in, stripped screws, Push on Pinch Roller rubber when they should be going to Terry for new rubber put on correctly. Cut wires all over the place, wrong belt sizes put on, power supply work that looked like a grade school person did it and I can go on and on. These people do more damage than good and then charge you for it.  One service guy said to the client that he could not repair the deck- what was wrong with the deck? A shorted Zener Diode. How hard can that be to detect? A first year Electronic college student would be able to find this.

If you have a nice deck like this be careful where you have it serviced as a typical $300 repair can easily get into the $800 range when we have to take off motor plate stand offs and install new ones and repair all kinds of other destruction caused by the service person.

If you watch this and think you need to pay $120 for this board, it is just another example of a person ready to rip you off when none of that is needed. If the left (Supply) reel table turns when you are suppose to be playing a tape in the forward direction on a Tascam 122 Mk III or 112 MkII, but this reel has drive to the left, it is because through handling the deck you have sent a signal to the controller that said to go to reverse mode. The deck uses the same IC as is in the 112R Mk II so there is a reverse mode in it.

How to fix it without $120 of fancy circuits that are not needed? A dB25 connector and a tact switch or even a set of wires that you can short together. Me in the business built a dB25 with tact switch- you only use it to get the deck in the right mode again and then disconnect it and you won’t need it again. What he is doing with all those ICs I have no idea. With the dB25 which fit the remote connector on the rear of the deck is connect pin 24- Ground to Pin 1- Play mode. The deck goes into play with this one push the correct direction. Now disconnect the remote connector and the deck will work correctly after that- I know as I have done it. I service these all the time. dB25 are pretty cheap and most Technicians and Broadcast Engineers have them sitting around like I did. Don’t be tricked into $120 rip off.

Isn’t everybody being taken for a ride with these two large monopoly partners? Internet service for $80/Mo from Comcast and not much better for AT&T. I can not give either of them a high rating unless you consider the Crook category.

Personally I would like some third party come along and eliminate them both- they both are filled with incompetent people. Is this the best that government can manage? We know that Illinois is full of crooked politicians but isn’t there another solution? Where’s the fiber cable they were suppose to put in?

Anybody got a better solution?

I walk by the TV to see so much junk being spewed out by the government controlled media. You waste your time with this junk.

Want to find out what is happening and is important in this World? http://siriusdisclosure.com/

http://www.disclosureproject.org/

Evidence

For those who own this machine there is a weak part in it called S301 which is the solenoid ALPs direction switch. Once this starts to go bad you can try and spray it with Deoxit but that might not even work given the tiny and poorly made switch design. The correct answer is to put a properly designed switch in by Kurt Jacobs which is sold on E bay. This fellow has done some homework and has made a correctly made part that should have been put in the deck of this price in the first place. Ebay Item# 153025190388

I, as a past Teac Lead Technician recommend this part!

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Teac-X-2000R-replacement-reel-tape-direction-switch-S301-replaces-P-N-5302102500/153068294998?hash=item23a394d356:g:CwQAAOSw5cNYiptN

I am in communication with certain people who are often E bay sellers and sellers of Reel Decks on other sites. One guy told me that 99% of reel to reel users do not know the machine they are buying is bad and so that gives him the go ahead to not adjust them correctly. Another guy who I asked what do you check the speed with as in test tape and measuring device? He answered it sounds good to me!

People are buying decks at higher prices and getting equipment with the most minimum of service done to them as well as them being off speed and who knows what they calibrate them to. All these people would be classified as Hacks by the good Technicians that exist out there. These are the Knuckleheads that you are being ripped off by as the decks are not even close to correct. I am writing this to make you aware of this prevailing mindset in the used equipment sales of Reel to Reel and Cassette decks.  I never knew it was this bad and I do not intend to overlook the stuff I see. You can also tell how well the machine is worked on by asking what length warranty they have if any.

I know I can be negative at times but when I find a supplier that goes beyond the call of duty I mention that too.

That is Stereomanuals.com

For those of you with expensive portable equipment or even flashlight like Mag-lites. One of the worse things you can put into a device is an Alkaline battery. They are destructive and leak every time. They could be considered hazardous material the way they destroy electronics by their leaking and corrosive fluids. I am surprised that the EPA has not outlawed these terrible junk batteries and there are many better choices that will cost you less in the long run. I suggest you get Tenergy NMH or Nickel Metal Hydride batteries that may cost more initially but when you can use them 1000 times there is not a lot to figure out that they are worth a pile of money saved. I even have some AA cells from 2001 that still work. The important part though is that the DO NOT LEAK. Abandon the purchase of junk Alkaline batteries, save money and your equipment too. Head over to All-battery and buy the Tenergy product like I do and no more trouble. No I do not own or work at ALL-battery. I just have had very good luck buying their product and not one failure yet- 9V all the way to AAA and they have rechargeable 123A batteries too. Here is to make it easy for you-

http://www.all-battery.com/ni-mhbatteries.aspx

It is a very good chance that this deck will become a part unit with that kind of damage.