My wife had finished watching a tape and was putting in a new one, when the
VCR shut itself off. Now, whether I push the power button on the unit or on
the remote, the VCR will turn on, then turn off after about 3 seconds. The
video will output whatever channel the VCR is tuned to during that time.

If I insert a tape, then the unit will turn on for about 14 seconds - long
enough to load the tape and wrap the tape around the upper cylinder.

Opening up the unit, the belts are a little loose (the unit is 4 years old),
but all of the motors seem to work and spinning properly. During the tape
load process, the tape is fowarded and reversed. I left it unplugged for 24
hours to no avail. I also tried holding the power button on the remote for
7seconds, which only caused the kid-lock to become engaged.

When the unit is 'off' the clock is displayed as appropriate. After I
reapplied AC power, the unit went into its 'Auto' mode to get the time and
channels. This is about a 2 minute process. It did get the time from a
local TV station, and it also retrieved the channel list.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Paul