Mr. Mike wrote:
I have a Sony TC-758 reel to reel tape recorder which was given to me
by a friend. It hasn't been used for many years, but allegedly worked
prior to it being given to the friend. But now it doesn't work
properly.

There are 5 buttons on the right of the machine which control stop,
play, fast forward, reverse play and rewind (this machine has
auto-reverse). It works fine for fast forward and rewind ... the tape
gets up to a good speed.

But when you push "play" or "reverse play," the rubber wheels in
front of the playback heads don't move the tape forward so it will
play. There is a "clicking" noise, and some slight motion in the
rubber wheels and the mechanism underneath, but that's it. Rather
than playing, the tape starts to fast forward or rewind, though not
as fast as the actual fast forward or rewind speeds.

Here is a more detailed explanation:

If you take off the cover over the heads, there are two "poles" that
the cover slips down over on the right and left. To the left of the
left "pole," when you push "play" (in either direction), there is
some metal thing underneath down inside below the surface (like a
lever) which moves slightly to the left (the one on the right side
does not move at all) -- this is connected to the mechanism that
causes the rubber heads to push the tape up against the playback
heads so the tape will be heard -- accompanied by a clicking noise. I
took a stick and pushed this left lever slightly to the left ... and
it makes a clicking noise (tick-tick-tick-tick-etc.) like a telegraph
machine.

I made a brief video (about 9 megs in size) which illustrates this.

http://www.mjq.net/misc/video.avi

Any idea what is wrong? Is this an electrical problem, or does it
just need some lubrication and/or a good push (not off a dock :-)?

Looks like mainly lubrication issues, but this mechanism also uses belts to
accomplished the auto-reverse by flipping the head block around. This belt
(or 2 - don't exactly remember) will also need changing, and the head block
removed and disassembled for re-lubrication. This type of repair is best
left to professionals.


Mark Z.