Hi Folks. Almost nowhere on any of the vintage radio/TV forums do I ever see any tutorials as to how to repair our old equipment. The British monthly, Television, was good with explaining the operation of how a particular TV chassis or video recorder worked. However that magazine died years ago, and there is nothing like it on the forums.

Owners of equipment with, Issues, receive advise from forum members familiar with electronic repairs, but this advice without teaching.

Since there are fewer and fewer ex-repair technicians remaining, it is probably time to for me, at least, to say how I approached repairing Video recorders on a daily basis.

Although there an infinite number of approaches as to repairing faulty sets, others will surely disagree with my approach but, I am describing my approach, not yours.

Anyway, I do hope this is of help.

The Beginning.
I would pick up a job card from the repairs/quotes tray.
Read the job card to see the product, TV, VCR, Microwave, Camcorder, Stereo, Car radio...... You get the idea. We will stick with VCR for this example. Next, the brand, the fault if known, and the model number.

Remember, the fault as described, is coming from the customer, not another technician.

I would read the location of the VCR and collect it, place it onto my service bench, check my coffee cup for contents and temperature, (important), and then before plugging in the set, take a minute to examine it.

I looked at the positions of all the visible switches, (but do not move), check for dents or scratches, broken buttons, then tilted up the front of the machine to look for water stains on the bottom's metal cover. Making any notes on the back of the job card.

Next I liked to remove the top cover to continue the pre-plug in examination. It is not a good idea to plug in a machine, that has a child's plush toy pushed into the cassette flap. Once the deck mechanism can be viewed, I look for anything obvious. Foreign objects, video heads that have played more head cleaning tapes than movies Chrome coating abraded away. A pile of tape oxide below the pinch roller, Hard shiny pinch roller. the brake band missing, (National Panasonic). Simply put, anything that does not look right.

The above description of what I check took longer to write than it takes to perform.

The check is important. You only get one chance to check. What if you had wiggled every switch in site? The fault could have been a switch in the wrong position TV-VCR, Tuner-Cam, Ch3-Ch4, in fact a dirty switch.

Anyway, this will do for now.

My proposed post re switch types and their reliability or otherwise will now be pushed to the end of the to do list.

Stay tuned for the next installment.

Wayne.

Yes, a good "visual" most important.
I used to try and drum this into my apprentices, who quickly knew it all, diving in with what faults they had before with same machine.
Only to end in call backs.......
JJ

Whilst I do like to avoid things like video recorders, some things like rodent chewed tractor & vehicle wiring and similar in old radios are a constant problem as are the Monkeys & DIY destroyers.

It should be noted that in many cases DIY translates to "Destroy it Yourself"

I constantly promote, that if it is an unknown to you, especially old one & ones where the Monkey has been in it, "Step one" is to visually inspect & assess it. It is incredible, with some things, to realise you have in front of you, a death trap.

E.g. Rubber type figure eight wire on a radio from the 1950's, just taken out of service, due to hum and that cable had bare wire showing along its length.

MBVC

Back when I used to repair consumer electronics in a previous life, VCR,s were probably by default my main area of repairs since just about everyone had one and they constantly required attention.
It got to the stage where I pretty much knew what would be wrong before lifting the lid.
Every brand had it's particular issues.
Idler wheels and mode switches of all makes were in stock as well as belt kits and back up batteries, head drums etc.
I once had a VCR with three tapes jammed into it, one in the breach, one on top and another pushed in front.
It's amazing how accepting of they're poor performance we all were.

I once had a couple of Sony C40 Betamax machines and wish I still had them as I still have some tapes that I need to dub over to an MP4 file. Despite being of the more modern slimline front loader type, they were built like tanks with all metal chassis and ring gears for extracting the tape from the cassettes, unlike VHS machines of the same period which had by that stage moved on to the more troublesome white plastic and in many cases no longer made in Japan.

The weak point in a C40 in my view was the heads on the drum. They seemed more fragile than in VHS machines despite arguably sucking a better picture out of the tape. I kept head cleaning tapes well away from them and used alcohol from a pharmacy with swabs made of a chamois-like material to clean them plus the audio and erase heads.

If anyone has a working C40 and doesn't want much for it, I'd be happy to hear from them.

Although VHS won the consumer preference war, Sony Beta was the superior system and remained the work horse of television broadcast stations until digital technology burst onto the scene.

It was a slightly different format. In order to increase bandwidth to support broadcast standard pictures the tape speed was a lot faster than the domestic format. Betacam, as it was known, used a two hour tape in twenty minutes, for example. The cassettes were identical but the formats weren't cross-compatible. Before Sony released Betacam, TV stations used U-matic tapes and recorders, which were not exactly the most portable system. The head drum in a U-matic VCR is larger tham a grapefruit.

Repairing Video Tape Recorders. “The way I do it.”

Part 2.

Now we can get our hands dirty. I begin with the usual suspects. Well they will have to be checked sooner or later. Depending on which mechanism is in front of me, I check the ½ loading arm to see if it is seized. Likewise any little guides around the pinch roller.

The loading arms on the Akai VS-2, 3, 4, 6, 8, and 15 also seize, and by now, every last one of them WILL have seized. If one is foolish enough to
load in a tape and press play, then if the little loading belt, (bless its soul) is still good, the loading arm gears will break!
By the way, this series uses two micro switches, not a mode switch.

I remove the carriage to gain access to the reels etc. I release the brakes on the the take-up reel and supply reel in turn, and spin them as fast as I can using my thumb and fore finger. Tight or noisy?

Does the upper drum spin silently?

Well. The moment we have all waited for. We plug in the machine to check the reported complaint. Make sure that the room is quiet when you do this. There could be clues in any sound, motor shuffle etc.

This is the point where generalisations end. What happens next is dependent on the machine, the complaint/s, and what the result is when the machine is tested.

From here, you must use your senses.
Can you smell something burning?
Can you hear a fault? Bad drum bearings, motor running too long?
Does the display tube give a clue?

Merry Christmas
It is not far off.

Wayne.

An interesting surprise was when replacing Gold Cap memory caps as used in Panasonic VCR's.

The white stuff that oozed from them would, if touched by a hot soldering iron, cause a mini explosion spitting hot debris into your face.

Surprise!!

A hint: That's why they put Baking Soda aka Sodium Bi Carbonate in self raising flour. On attaining a certain temp it decomposes & blows up the cake.