I'm not a boombox aficionado, but I am currently working on one. I volunteer at a local repair café doing general electronics and other repairs. A month or so back, a couple brought in a rather sorry-looking Aiwa CS-600 and completed the fault form as "cannot insert tape".
The reason the tape would not go in was that the drive mechanism was engaged, and after opening it up, it was clear that all the belts had turned to black mush.
Work so far:
Service manual in hand and eBay to the rescue, I've now replaced the three belts, lubricated the various axle pins with a tiny dab of clock oil, given the mechanism a time to run with FF and REW, then recalibrated the motor speed (this I've done by ear, and then fine-tuned against a Spotify parallel playback, not ideal, not awful). I gave the pots a good clean with switch cleaner, and they now seem to be reasonably crackle-free, given their age. I replaced the nylon soft eject cord as that had been snapped.
It plays nicely enough, certainly a lot better than when it arrived. So far, so good.
Where I am struggling a little, though, is with the physical latch on the eject. It is not entirely clear to me how the mechanism triggers. It was working laid on its back before reassembly. The stop/eject button was lifting the black plastic latch reliably; by the time I had reassembled it, however, the latch had ceased to move when the eject button is pressed, so I've presumably nudged something out of alignment there. Any thoughts or clues would be appreciated, though I'm sure I'll puzzle it out if not.
As noted, the calibration was very much manual, and I don't do enough of these to spend too much on a better solution, though any thoughts on the best place to source a trustworthy reference tape would be appreciated.
The main reason for this post is the final part...
It came (as no doubt many do) with the aerial snapped off. The fixing is still there (a standard copper/brass tab with the screw hole) up to the hinge, but it is snapped off at that point.
Can anyone tell me the length, both extended and retracted, of the original aerial? More modern radios tend to be far smaller, and so most of the eBay aerials are too short. The retracted length I would expect to be around 36cm/14" based on the measurements. I have no idea how long the extended aerial would be though (1.5m?). Does anyone happen to know someone that might supply such a thing? In the end, I can find a replacement that is not so well matched, and it will be better than nothing, but I'd prefer to do the job right.
The reason the tape would not go in was that the drive mechanism was engaged, and after opening it up, it was clear that all the belts had turned to black mush.
Work so far:
Service manual in hand and eBay to the rescue, I've now replaced the three belts, lubricated the various axle pins with a tiny dab of clock oil, given the mechanism a time to run with FF and REW, then recalibrated the motor speed (this I've done by ear, and then fine-tuned against a Spotify parallel playback, not ideal, not awful). I gave the pots a good clean with switch cleaner, and they now seem to be reasonably crackle-free, given their age. I replaced the nylon soft eject cord as that had been snapped.
It plays nicely enough, certainly a lot better than when it arrived. So far, so good.
Where I am struggling a little, though, is with the physical latch on the eject. It is not entirely clear to me how the mechanism triggers. It was working laid on its back before reassembly. The stop/eject button was lifting the black plastic latch reliably; by the time I had reassembled it, however, the latch had ceased to move when the eject button is pressed, so I've presumably nudged something out of alignment there. Any thoughts or clues would be appreciated, though I'm sure I'll puzzle it out if not.
As noted, the calibration was very much manual, and I don't do enough of these to spend too much on a better solution, though any thoughts on the best place to source a trustworthy reference tape would be appreciated.
The main reason for this post is the final part...
It came (as no doubt many do) with the aerial snapped off. The fixing is still there (a standard copper/brass tab with the screw hole) up to the hinge, but it is snapped off at that point.
Can anyone tell me the length, both extended and retracted, of the original aerial? More modern radios tend to be far smaller, and so most of the eBay aerials are too short. The retracted length I would expect to be around 36cm/14" based on the measurements. I have no idea how long the extended aerial would be though (1.5m?). Does anyone happen to know someone that might supply such a thing? In the end, I can find a replacement that is not so well matched, and it will be better than nothing, but I'd prefer to do the job right.
