Hey all, I’ve recently gone through the process of changing the drive gear in my DC2 (you probably remember me from another thread). I thought everything was looking tidy and running smoothly, but I’ve tested a tape and it seems to be playing way too quickly and sounds muffled. I’m not sure the head/pinch roller mechanism is actually engaging? Things I’ve changed: 1. Drive gear - could anything in the gearing cause the issue? I’m fairly certain I put everything back in the correct order. Anything obvious I could’ve missed? 2. Battery wires - so I unsoldered the battery wires from the motherboard when I took it apart. Can anyone just confirm I soldered them back in the correct place? I’m not putting too much power through it or anything (5v vs 3.3v?) 3. Capstan rubber - this was seemingly a simple straight swap. The old rubber wasn’t really worn but I changed it because I had the new part and I was already inside etc. 4. Pinch roller - is it supposed to contact the spindle when you push play? There doesn’t seem to be any movement in the mechanism when I push play. Have I missed something here? The yellow wire came off the head when I was fitting the lower mech back together but I think I’ve soldered it okay? If you guys know anything obvious I’m missing then any help would be appreciated. This is the first time I’ve ever fixed one of these and I don’t want to see a good DC2 go to waste! p.s link to video of playback: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1F-6Q94C90_hoVN7lVTIpQrfJOYt90Q4R/view?usp=drivesdk
When you push play the head block should come down along with the pinch roller, if it’s not coming down sounds like the main take-up reel is just pulling the tape through hence playing to fast.
Hello @automatom . Your engaging lever is wrongly positioned , it has two hooks underneath (the portion in the red circle below) that should be positioned through the right rectangular hole (as we see your picture) , fix that and probably you're good to go . See also this picture from another thread for the correct position : http://stereo2go.com/forums/attachments/20171123_212051-jpg.9357/
Yeah, I would’ve removed that washer, it was just one I made that didn’t fit properly. Which spring do you mean?
It's the spring of the engaging lever. It seems it's catching in that post where the play button is supposed to go. I think one of the pins on which the spring hooks to may be broken. It's something mentioned in the tutorial of replacing the center gear and can be fixed.
Hey, so I clicked the lever through the right-hand hole like @Machaneus suggested and now the pinch roller engages and the tape plays at the correct speed. The issue now is I’m getting a LOT of noise through the left-hand channel when I push play. What’s strange is even if I take the tape out and push play, the same noise still plays out the left-hand channel. Any ideas?
Regarding the noise the first I would check is the wire connections to the tape head . In one of your photos above the red wire to the tape head looks poorly connected or not connected at all , you don't mention if you hear music with the noise , nevertheless you can start by checking these wires for good connections at both ends , keep in mind yellow wire "earth" is common to the right hand side of the tape head leads .
