Hi,

MY VCR is playing up ! Its been working fine for years (this model was
made in 1991 !) what happens is that when a tape is inserted the
machine does one of three things.

1. plays the tape, but only displays maybe 1-2 seconds of film on the
TV, (with no sound) and then returns to the blue screen. It then might
stop playing, but then won't do anything else, only let me eject the
tape or switch the unit off.

2. plays the tape, but the counter won't advance past 00 00000, the
tape is being spooled, but again, only a second or so of film, and
then blue screen.

3. tape will play, (as before) but won't rewind or fast forward at the
correct speed, just very slowly.

I've had the lid off and had a poke around, there's nothing obvious
amiss inside of course. The only thing that is baffling me is that I
cleaned the heads and that seemed to fix the unit for a day, and then
I used it again and it was faulty. Then I also had a poke around
earlier today and it sprang back into life again (counter advanced,
play and fast forward and rewind were ok) - but now when I ejected the
tape, it mangled the tape and trapped it ! Now I've got the tape out,
its back to doing one of 1, 2, or 3 !

Its a shame to bin it, as I'm sure its something trivial and probably
not expensive.

many thanks for any pointers, thanks Simon