Hello. My Clairtone 7980 all of a sudden has poor fm radio reception. The am, cassette, and line in are fine. Any ideas. It’s hard to even listen to fm as the stations come in very weak and staticky
Clairtone 7980 fm radio poor reception
- Thread starter donahuest
- Start date
AM uses an internal fixed rod antenna on the tuner board so that may be why it's not effected. Since this seems to have happened suddenly, the first thing I would check is the antenna mast support tab screws inside for the antennas on the back cover. They transfer the signal from the antennas to the wire going to the tuner board. Also, if care is not taken when the back is removed from previous servicing, the harness connection to the tuner board can get pulled and create a cracked solder joint with intermittent connection. So while it's apart, try wiggling the FM antenna connector on the tuner board to see if the signal increases/decreases with movement.
Once you get out of this area of troubleshooting then cleaning switches and checking tuner alignment is next. But proper alignment takes special equipment. You certainly do not want to "tweak" any adjustments as it is next to impossible without test equipment. Usually when a tuner board starts to get weak and drift, they do so slowly. So a sudden change would likely be a lose connection somewhere (cold solder joint, dirty selector switch, loose antenna wiring, etc.)
Once you get out of this area of troubleshooting then cleaning switches and checking tuner alignment is next. But proper alignment takes special equipment. You certainly do not want to "tweak" any adjustments as it is next to impossible without test equipment. Usually when a tuner board starts to get weak and drift, they do so slowly. So a sudden change would likely be a lose connection somewhere (cold solder joint, dirty selector switch, loose antenna wiring, etc.)
The tuner section has a plastic square cover about 1x1 inches. On it are 4 flathead screws. These screws are similar to a trim pot- they become oxidized with age. I most recently as in 3 days ago, sprayed a contact cleaner through holes. It became filled and went completely out of whack .I turned the 4 screws out of position then back in original position , each screw a few times. Earlier today , leaving the FM station on a station I knew when i sprayed, I saw the contact cleaner had dried up and powered it up , and turned the screws back and forth . The tuner did come back to life and crackling and volume issues were gone. This may not be the answer for you , OP excellent points , just figured i`d add another possibility. FYI the box this was done on is a Candle JTR-1287 .