The community repair thread

Danny1969

Kittyfrisk said:

I'm sure that you are right in deducing "I'm sure the problem is either a faulty connection as wriggling things about usually restores power - just as with my old tubescreamer."
The problem comes when the wriggle cure finally quits altogether or something arcs & damages the motherboard 
A decent output USB-C power supply should keep things going, but I'd be trying to minimise the amount of plugging/unplugging done as the USB-C connections are not very robust & then you will have no plan 'C'.
Honestly, despite the moaning wailing & gnashing of teeth from your better half, getting it sorted under warranty is something I'd try before you don't have the option anymore.

I totally agree with this, getting it sorted under warranty would be best. Back it up though as they don't tend to change DC sockets or get involved in any board repair, they just tend to change the board or change the laptop so data loss is likely if it's a Chromebook or similar laptop where the SSD is soldered to the board. 

Be interested in what model it is though... Asus maybe ?

ToneControl

can't you borrow a laptop for your wife to use while you get this one fixed?

gretschthumper

Fixing a Sony cassette deck today, a TCK611s - door won't open, & capstan not turning. I figure belts are the issue, as there's one for each on these transports, plus Sony belts of this age are known to turn to goo over time. Not dealt with one of these before - I've worked on reel-to-reels quite a bit, but compared to those everything is so tiny in these mechanisms. I do some watches, and it's a bit like working on a wristwatch compared to a pocketwatch 

The youtube video I was using for reference said "make sure the cassette door is open when you begin" - well that's no good, as it's one of the things that doesn't work ... so I took the front panel off to get the transport out, disconnected the various leads to remove it:


I don't have pics, but both belts had turned to goo, which I removed with a plastic scraper & isopropyl alcohol. The capstan drive on its own would've been easy, but the belt for the open/close mechanism took quite a bit of disassembly to get at ... Youtube is so helpful with this sort of thing, a video being worth a thousand words as they say ... I'd already bought belts & a new pinch roller, so those were fitted and the transport was put back into the deck

When everything was back together it actually worked! Surprised that the door mechanism did, as I did a lot of stretching & straining it to get at the necessary screws - I thought I might've damaged it:



Really satisfying to have got it all working again 

Sorry about the lack of pics, it all got a bit involved! I'll try & take more next time 

ToneControl

gretschthumper said:

Fixing a Sony cassette deck today, a TCK611s - door won't open, & capstan not turning. I figure belts are the issue, as there's one for each on these transports, plus Sony belts of this age are known to turn to goo over time. Not dealt with one of these before - I've worked on reel-to-reels quite a bit, but compared to those everything is so tiny in these mechanisms. I do some watches, and it's a bit like working on a wristwatch compared to a pocketwatch 

The youtube video I was using for reference said "make sure the cassette door is open when you begin" - well that's no good, as it's one of the things that doesn't work ... so I took the front panel off to get the transport out, disconnected the various leads to remove it:


I don't have pics, but both belts had turned to goo, which I removed with a plastic scraper & isopropyl alcohol. The capstan drive on its own would've been easy, but the belt for the open/close mechanism took quite a bit of disassembly to get at ... Youtube is so helpful with this sort of thing, a video being worth a thousand words as they say ... I'd already bought belts & a new pinch roller, so those were fitted and the transport was put back into the deck

When everything was back together it actually worked! Surprised that the door mechanism did, as I did a lot of stretching & straining it to get at the necessary screws - I thought I might've damaged it:



Really satisfying to have got it all working again 

Sorry about the lack of pics, it all got a bit involved! I'll try & take more next time 

I have the exact same model with the same problem
please tell me where to get the bits

How much skill does it take to fix it?

gretschthumper

If you search ebay Decktech sell the belt kit for £8.95
Pinch roller came from Hi-Fi Retro Parts in Slovakia for £4

If you search for "PW restoration" channel on Youtube he has some very good videos about how to do a belt change - that way you can judge for yourself if you're up to the task ... 

Danny1969

@gretschthumper ;
Excellent work there, well done 

thermionic

It's been at the back of my mind to replace the belts on my old TEAC for a while... However, first I have found a laser pickup assembly on ebay for my Marantz CD player, which has been collecting dust since it started skipping every cd placed in it.

gretschthumper

thermionic said:

It's been at the back of my mind to replace the belts on my old TEAC for a while... However, first I have found a laser pickup assembly on ebay for my Marantz CD player, which has been collecting dust since it started skipping every cd placed in it.

I have an old Aiwa CD player that does the same ... might take a look at that next. 

These old things do require a bit of maintenance.

(How come something from the 1990s is old ...  How did that happen? Seems like only yesterday ...)

marauder

I did the one of those Sony decks.  Belts had turned to goo.   Took longer to clean up than do the job.

thermionic

I have posted about this earlier in the thread, but I have a Marantz CD player that was skipping disastrously with every CD. I tried cleaning the laser lens and the rail that the laser head travels along to no avail. It cost me £350-400 and was only about 4 years old when it broke, so I really wanted to fix it. All I could find in terms of spare parts was a complete drive mechanism from a Chinese online seller for about £85 and I thought the risk of it a) not being the correct part, or b) not fixing the problem was a bit too much. I left it for a couple of years but couldn’t be bothered to stick it on ebay for spares or repairs. A couple of weeks ago I decided to google it again and found a brief forum post describing how someone had replaced the laser head for the same model as I have… and I found a UK hifi spares seller on ebay with the part I needed for £20. Worth a try!

The fun part was figuring out how to take it apart! 

https://i.imgur.com/Q19CSIM.jpg

It was easy to take out the head assembly out of the plastic drive housing and swap over the new one.

https://i.imgur.com/zdSA9kt.jpeg

The laser diode has its terminals shorted together for antistatic protection, so you have to desolder a link between two pads before it will work. You can see the solder bridge here in the top right corner of the pcb, next to the ribbon connector socket.

https://i.imgur.com/8MzjbLT.jpeg

The forum post I had found mentioned desoldering as the last step, however once I’d replaced the drive mechanism I could just about reach the pads with my soldering iron tip, but I couldn’t reach it with the soldering iron tip and desoldering braid… so I disassembled it. It becomes easier to reassemble after the first time - you learn what to do and in which order, like which end of the many ribbon cables to plug in first and which end to leave loose.

I plugged it in and it appeared to work, although spinning a CD was very noisy and there was distortion which disappeared when I pressed certain parts of the plastic housing. I reckoned something must have been misaligned, possibly causing some friction somewhere. So I disassembled it again! This time it worked, spinning silently and with no distortion - success!

However, despite using the sorting tray of my iFixit toolkit to be organised and methodical, I ended up, inexplicably, with this:

https://i.imgur.com/ZfWWtaj.jpeg

I can account for one of the copper plated screws as the hole for one of the 15 or so screws that holds the front panel to the chassis had stripped (or a plastic boss had snapped off), but not the other three, nor the other silver ones! I spent ten minutes with a torch and a magnifying glass before I put the lid on, but just couldn’t find any empty holes. Anyway, it’s now working again.

Kittyfrisk

^  Nice work & the screws will come in handy eventually 
Was there any alignment of the new laser head needed?

thermionic

No, it’s solidly mounted on the rail and it played fine straight away. I think there’s a degree of float in the mechanism that spins the disk and there’s a feedback loop that keeps the laser beam and the track aligned.

The head assembly that cost £17 (+ postage) is the metal plate that has the rails, the diode assembly, and two electric motors (one to spin the disk and the other to track the head along the rail). It mounts onto the plastic tray mechanism with 4 screws and rubber grommets at each corner.

Emp_Fab

I spy with my little eye - an iFixit toolkit !

Chris.B

@thermionic Good work, it's great to rescue a device from landfill.  

Could you let me know the details of the supplier of your laser please. I have a Naim CDS, a very expensive CD player in it's day and I've spent a lot of time trying to find a laser unit, without success.  Unfortunately it is gathering dust, just for the want of a laser assembly.

thermionic

Chris.B said:

@thermionic Good work, it's great to rescue a device from landfill.  

Could you let me know the details of the supplier of your laser please. I have a Naim CDS, a very expensive CD player in it's day and I've spent a lot of time trying to find a laser unit, without success.  Unfortunately it is gathering dust, just for the want of a laser assembly.

It was the ebay shop of https://mapleaudio.co.uk/ - worth asking them as although my CD is a Marantz, the laser head is made by Sanyo I think.

Googling for replacement parts now seems to give a lot more useful results now than when I initially looked about 3-4 years ago. 

vasselmeyer

Saved myself £33 + P&P when I replaced the jack on my Shure IEMs when I was only getting one side through. It was definitely the jack itself as wobbling the cable brought the sound back and it happened on two different devices. The wires in the cable are really thin but I was able to strip back the L&R enough to get a decent solder connection.

Danny1969

vasselmeyer said:

Saved myself £33 + P&P when I replaced the jack on my Shure IEMs when I was only getting one side through. It was definitely the jack itself as wobbling the cable brought the sound back and it happened on two different devices. The wires in the cable are really thin but I was able to strip back the L&R enough to get a decent solder connection.

A man after my own heart. I know you can buy the cable for £20 but if you can fix it for nothing then that's the best way. I've done one of sets twice. 

Chris.B

thermionic said:

It was the ebay shop of https://mapleaudio.co.uk/ - worth asking them as although my CD is a Marantz, the laser head is made by Sanyo I think.

Googling for replacement parts now seems to give a lot more useful results now than when I initially looked about 3-4 years ago. 

@thermionic Thanks for the link I'll have a look at their site and see if they have anything to suit.  I believe the CDS was based on a Philips laser, but it was a rare CD player - sounded wonderful when it was new. 

Danny1969

Here's a quick repair, a Yamaha E kit Hi-hat. I've done a couple of these for a school. They fail due to a design flaw but there's an easy solution for a fix if the kits in a static position all the time, like it is at the school. 



The fault is the trigger signal if intermittent or not there at all and here's what fails 



With the rubber removed you can see the stereo jack used for the output has come loose on the PCB because A: Japanese manufacturers use the cheapest sockets they can source and B, the metal bracket than is meant to secure it has fractured due to the constant vibration. 



So I could weld the bracket and solder the same socket or a nre one on again but what's the point. It will only fail again because you can't make a solid joint against a vibrating surface. Ironically a plastic bracket would have stood up better than a metal bracket in this application,   So here's how I fix them. Lose the socket, push a piece of mic cable through the holes. Push the wires through the PCB and solder underneath, Then use a cable tie as a primitive but effective solutuion to stop the cable being pulled, cover with hot glue and fit a female 1\4 stereo socket on the end. Check the joints and bracket on the other side and beef up with hot glue before it gets a chance to break. 



So it's got a 1M trailing lead on it which is enough length so the next cable can plug into it on the ground. Drum teacher who gives me those work says it's reliable and doesn't go wrong again. 

Danny1969

Oh here's one thing that caused a head scratcher a couple of months ago. Customer brings in a bass for a new volume pot. I change the pot and also resolder the jack socket as whoever soldered it before had done a terrible job. I give the bass back and customer reports a loss of treble. I get the bass back and yeah there is a loss and at a path to ground somewhere but I can't see where. Then I decide out of interest to measure the output jack and look at this 



What had happened was over the many years beer and sweat had got between the laminate layers of the jack but for the most part weren't hurting anything. I guess when I heated the socket to resolder it this vile liquid flowed and created a primitive 130K ish  resistor in the socket across signal and ground which loaded the pickup and sucked the top end off. 

I don't get involved in guitar electronics unless it's active pre amps and stuff so first time I have seen that