Pioneer 909L Tape Deck Belt Help Needed Please

Hi guys! First up I gotta say what a great forum you have going here with some quality boxes on show, most of which I have never seen before. Being born in 1966 boomboxes, breakdancing and bodypopping were big when I was in my teens and I had a lovely sharp that I so wish I'd have kept but unfortunately this got played to death and then one day dumped
A few years ago my younger brother was going to dump his old (he'd had it from new) pioneer 909L that he had totally lost interest in. The tape deck wasn't working and he hadn't gotten round to having it fixed so I said I would take it of him and see what I could do. That was about three years ago and what with having such a busy life it sat in my loft and I haven't got round to attempting to fix this until now. Everything else on the box is working great and although the box has a few battle scars it's still in good shape and sounding good.
My uneducated guess is that the belts need changing on the tape deck. Sometimes when a tape is in the deck it will turn very slightly and then stop but most of the time when I press play nothing happens!!!
Can any of you knowledgeable dudes help me out with some advice on what belts I need and how I go about changing them.

Many thanks. Paul

Welcome Paul your guess is most likely right. The older decks mostly always need a real good cleaning, lubing, new belts, all rubber tires cleaned good and demagnetizing. All of this should get her back to new again

Thanks bbb.

I spent the best part of 2 hours last night taking the box apart and have found the problem

I first removed the back plastic cover(s) and then after taking lots of photos unplugged all the cables and plugs from the large outer and small top pcb(s) from inside, these were connected and could not be seperated. I then removed the screws securing these pcbs and then lowered them. Behind the large outer pcb is a smaller inner pcb which i unscrewed and lifted to reveal the rear of the tape deck assembly and hey presto there was the problem!!!
The first belt that I saw (under black plastic cover) had turned into a gooey black tar. This "was" a square sectioned belt, each side measuring approx 1mm wide and had connected two nylon wheels/ pulleys.

I have now cleaned all the black tar and have tracked down a new belt so fingers crossed when this arrives and is fitted and the box put back together all should be well.
The other 3 belts that I could see looked ok but as I have ordered a set of 4 I think I will have a go a replacing the others although this looks a little move involved to get to those and looks like I'm going to have to remove the whole tape assembly. Any advice on this would be much appreciated and also de-magnetizing.

Thanks Paul

Great find, the Pioneer SK-909 is very collectable and hard to find, even with a few scars!

wills15 said:

Great find, the Pioneer SK-909 is very collectable and hard to find, even with a few scars!

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Welcome Paul!

Thanks guys for the welcome! I'm still waiting for the belts to come in. When they do and I have it up and running again I'll try and post some pics. Does anybody know where I could get a "repair manual" for the 909 or even if one exists.