Philips 70CD555 adventure

[Arbusto67]

Hello everyone, about one month ago I was able to win an auction for one of my holy grail, the Philips 70CD555 in the title. It's in very good conditions, save for a couple scratches (nothing major) and part of the plastic finishing foil peeled off form the right speaker box. I tested it and the radio is working, after a brief lens cleaning even the CD player works (almost incredible), obviously the cassette player did not, not even tried putting a cassette in, and the display stated error (cassette lid impossible to open). This device sounds very nice, even if the D8644 sounds better... After tearing it apart I reset the mechanism by rotating one of the flywheels and the error disappeared. Used it like that for a couple weeks and in the meantime I bought a spare gear for the one that always disintegrates in this mechanism. After dismantling the unit almost completely I managed to replace the crumbled gear (in this case a YouTube video by Daniela Spieler has been very helpful, thanks a lot!) and the flywheels belt, reassembled everything and the cassette deck only works partially, fast forward and review are OK but trying to play a cassette results in the classic tape salad because the winding reel doesn't spin (and this occurs in both play directions). So I have to dismantle everything again to try and understand what's wrong with the cassette mechanism and, let me tell, this unit is a nightmare to tear apart and reassemble because of the number of screws it uses, there's literally a ton of screws of different sizes and the service manual doesn't exactly specify which screw goes where, moreover there are many circuit boards with a lot of connectors (some of them completely similar between each other) and it's very difficult to fit everything in correctly. I end up saying that, after having reassembled the unit, I have now some spare screws that I wasn't able to fit, and I even paid attention in what I was doing...
Lastly here is a photo (sorry, maybe it's a bit dark).
Please wish me luck for the next time I'll try and repair the deck .

 

[Eddy]

I have 2 of these , so on both only the tuner works and like almost all the speaker foil come off one one.
These were extremely expensive in the 80's
I saw the repairs that Daniela did , awesome

 

[Arbusto67]

So guys I have a small update, now even the cassette deck is working as it should (it was a small sliding piece on the rocking arm that alternatively moves the spools that did not move freely) but unfortunately now the CD player display shows four "8" instead of the track time and both displays are not lighted anymore, maybe I messed up something with the connectors, go figure.
I'll have to open that thing again and, believe me, it's the last thing I would like to do, tearing apart this device is an utter nightmare, I need a very big dose of bravery...

 

[Arbusto67]

Tested the Philips further and even the radio doesn't seem to be working properly, the reception is somewhat low and the stereo LED doesn't light up steadily.
This old devices seem to be more and more fragile the more you try and fix them, very annoying...

 

[Eddy]

A lot of info on restoring the 555

Home - Philips 70CD555

The long way to recover a legend from the 80s PHILIPS 70CD555 About Read more First Aid Franks Sound Machine (Project #8) CD-Player More to come… Tape Deck More to come… AM/FM Radio More to come… Amplifier More to come… Back to the 80s Produced from 1986 to 1987 the Philips CD555 was a – back...

70cd555.com

 

[Arbusto67]

Thanks, already found that site, incredible amount of useful informations on the CD555, I even found something on Stereo2go forum from the same author (Daniela) and others.