Got all these old tapes we made. Not much on TV these days, new shows are all cops and robbers or murders, or surreal movies or really terrible sitcom reruns, very few of which were any good in the first place. Plus I got too much time on my hands.

Sometimes it works, then not. Displays a bunch of error codes and I am having trouble finding out what they mean. It has L 07 11, L15 60, L 18 11, L 00 11.

If it ejects it seems fine, until it doesn't. Then after while it ejects and then is OK, but if plugged in with a tape in it, it is really uncooperative.

The 11 code on the end has something to do with the eject not being complete. Couple of other codes have to do with not being able to tell what mode it is in or something.

So I am thinking mode switch which is the colloquial term used by VCR tech for the mechanical state switch. However I am having trouble figuring out how to get it out to clean it. I already resoldered the connector to it on the board, no good. It worked a few times and then threw up an error code, not sure which, it seems to like to throw about 4 different ones at random.

Right now there is a tape in it so it will probably not work until tomorrow, and that is where it does not sound like a mode switch. I've never heard of a switch going thermal.

This sounds like something that was in a service bulletin from Sony a long time ago, I got 2 with this problem. The other is a 740 but inside they are identical. The 740 is a sacrificial goat because it has other problems and some corrosion from being in a bad environment.

Anyone remember working on these things ? Actually I was out of it when they came out and working on bigscreens mostly, so when they were newer I never worked on one.

Any ideas appreciated. I want to watch my old tapes !