Sony SLV-575UC VCR not loading tapes properly
 

Hello Everyone about a year ago I purchased at the Goodwill I'm currently working at (I didn't work there when I bought the unit) a Sony Prosumer Grade VHS Player Model SLV-575UC that was working perfectly when I last used it a month ago, but now all the sudden when I went to try and use it tonight to watch some newly acquired NOS Red Skelton Tapes that were still sealed in the original packaging but for some reason the tapes wouldn't play and the Real Time Counter wasn't working and so I took the VCR apart thinking maybe it was a bad belt and sure enough it uses the same toothed belt as the old Sony Betamax VCRs do, and the belt was in excellent condition yet so I buttoned the bottom of the case back up and took it apart and checked the top side with the tape loaded and sure enough only half of the loading mechanism is working, the right side take-up arm works but not the left side one, and the captsan roller arm doesn't engage the tape properly with the capstan pincher/counter wheel assembly. So does anyone on here have any ideas as to why a Sony Prosumer Grade VCR would all of the sudden stop working correctly after only a month of sitting unused? Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Levi

Sounds like the TU load arm gear broke. Look at the botton of the mechanism and see if the gear on picture #1 is cracked or in 2 pieces. (A triangular metal plate has been removed to see the gear in the picture.)

Good luck finding a replacement.


Or, the half-load arm is stuck, seized from the old grease. See picture #2. That spring-loaded arm should move freely with your finger.

Alright, I'll take a look at those things tomorrow when I get off of work.
I'm kind of curious though how this thing could of started acting up like this in just a little over a month's time, because the last time I used this VCR which was a little over a month ago when me and a friend of mine watched a movie on my LCD Projector in my basement on this VCR, it was working just fine.

That gear has constant spring tension from a spring that fits inside the gear which eventually causes it to crack or break in two.

The half-load or "pivot" arm as called in the picture can get stuck from just sitting, as the old grease will turn to damn near glue!

OK, I noticed on mine that the gears you're talking about on the bottom are covered with a PC Board of some sort. Did you have to remove a circuitboard to get to the gears underneath?

I was speaking in general terms about that mechanism. Some models were accessible from the bottom, others you have to remove the mechanism as an assembly from the top.

I always used to unplug the connector and ribbon cables shown in the picture still connected, to completely move the board out of the way.

btw all pictures I found in minutes by Googling the model number and searching "Images". Very handy.

OK, well you were right the gear you spoke of was broken, it was cleanly broken in half, I was able to glue the gear back together with some special plastic bonder glue that was made by Loctite so hopefully it will hold. I'm guessing that this gear breaking in half like this is quite common on this and other similar models made by Sony?

Yes very common.

OK, I was curious because interestingly enough I saw this same exact VCR in the e-waste pile in the basement of the coffee shop that I used to work for which was a drop-off point for an e-waste center owned and operated by the organization that owned the coffee shop I used to work at. I'm wordering if that VCR I saw in the e-waste pile at the coffee shop I used to work at had the same problem which was why it was broght there by its previous owners.

Maybe the broken gear, or perhaps the seized half-load arm that pulls the tape to the CTL head so the counter can count. Repaired many of those back in the day. Used to order 20 gears at a time, until they became discontinued.

If that glue holds the plastic gear together with the spring inside the gear under constant pressure like it's supposed to be, I want to know the part number for that glue! Might be handy stuff to have.

Me and a friend fixed a VCR with the same mech and same gear problem. It was an S-VHS deck with 1000 in it's model #. I glued the gear back together with super glue, let it dry for 15 minutes, put it together and it seems to have held up decently. I sold the deck to my friend a few months back after we fixed it, and he has not complained of failure so it seems to have held up.

Good to know super glue will hold that type of plastic. When I did it for a living and charged customers money, and had to guarantee the repair, I never tried gluing a gear. But nowadays you have to improvise.

I did have a few Sonys that developed a loose pressed-on worm gear on the load motor shaft and rather than have an estimate declined to replace a very expensive assembly, I would take the motor out, file a flat spot on the motor shaft, degrease the pulley and shaft and apply a tiny bit of JB Weld. I knew that sucker ain't spinning on the shaft again!

Oddly enough I tried gluing the gear back together using a glue specifically formulated for plastics made by Loctite and unless I wasn't doing somethiing right with when I was applying it the plastic broke right away even after letting it cure out over night. And I tried to see if I could try and glue it back together again but it seems that the glue "melted" the areas around the breaks to the point that it doesn't fit back together cleanly anymore. :sigh:

Welll my glue job on my gear didn't hold up like I thought it would sadly enough. And I went to look on ebay to see if I could find a parts unit and sure enough they had about 15 of these VCRs listed on there but all of them wanted over $300+ for them, there was one VCR that had a video dropout issue but otherwise a mechanically sound unit for $29.95 buy it now price, but they want $35 for shipping which I can't justify that to my mother. :sigh:

One of these, SLV-R1000. One you have to take the mechanism out from the top to get to that gear.

I think my high school I graduated from had one of those VCRs because I had gotten a box full of spare remotes that the school was getting rid of and one of the remotes that I got in that box was a remote just like the one pictured with the VCR you just posted the picture of.

That is the one! An excellent performer that my friend sold me on wanting, then that machine gradually unsold it's self by constantly having major maintenance needs.

My friend now has 2 parts decks and a runner if I find another in good shape I might keep that one (since I can bum parts off of him).

Well as far as my VCR goes, it seems that even parts VCRs (which I had found over 15 of them listed on ebay for sale as either fully operable or NIB units, and even parts units), for well over $100 with some even going over $600, with outrageous shipping prices of well over $20-$40, which means I won't be able to get my hands on a parts unit anytime soon sadly enough because my mom is pretty picky about how much money I spend on parts to repair things (even though I'm making my own money now.) But yeah it seems that I'm just going to have to set this old Sony aside for now until I can locate a parts unit on the cheap.

My friend paid $75 for his parts deck on the bay and found that to be a great deal.

If it is your money then don't give your parents control of it or any info on how you spend it, and save wherever you can to maximize your discretionary income... If you are working for it and they want a piece or say over your money, then you can always threaten to stop working...They will rather have you be productive and they not get anything, than you not be productive and there not be anything for them to get...

When my folks try to make me use my money in any specific way I dislike I tell them I'm an adult/American and they have no rights to make me do anything, nor is it any of their business or legal right to know what I do with my money....Though they rarely try anything they know won't fly.

That's the problem My mom forced me to give her my checking and savings account log-in information so that she can take a look at my bank account and see how I'm spending my money and she'll always ask me to give an account for what all of my purchases were, and what not, and I don't really have any choice in the matter, because the state forced me to make her my representative payee in order to move out of the house (which was rather dirty in my opinion) and because of my disabilities I get Social Security and my mom is in charge of that money and that's where I get my rent money from and what not. And actually I did try to threaten my mom concerning the money issue and she just ended up throwing a hissy fit at me and forced me to appologize to her and told me never to pull such a stunt again. So yeah my mom is kind of a control freak when it comes to my money, and the state didn't help matters any. :sigh:

As far as whether or not $75 is a good price for a parts VCR that's not my say, because like I said my mom will throw a fit if she sees that I've bought something like a parts VCR for even $30, and seeing as I wasn't able to find one single parts VCR for my VCR on ebay for under $50 including shipping costs, its not likely that I'll be able to get this VCR fixed anytime soon, even though when it was working properly it played excellently, and had beutiful picture and sound.

Ouch! What a mess to be in...

I'd have probably stayed pissed and not given an inch when the hissy fit started. With control freaks and people who use emotional outbursts to get their way you need to meet their level of emotional response and exceed their level of resolve not to change your position....It takes a lot of energy to pitch fits and bully people and you can often wear such people out by being or appearing to be an immovable object on your positions. You can always give her major crap each time she gives you crap about your stuff. Another option is to get a different bank account elsewhere (or surreptitiously end her access to that account if she is not a co-signer of that account), NOT GIVE her the info to monitor your activity under any circumstances and change it so your paychecks go there...Heck threatening to do that may even be a bargaining chip to leverage fairness...The only money the state mandates she have a say over is disability (right?), so if she's bullying you so that you don't have control of money that is solely yours (what you work for), pull the rug out from under her and make it so she no longer has control of it...If she pitches a fit stand your ground, and if she threatens to do something substantially bad MAKE her agree to fair concessions to your rights to decide how it is spent in exchange for being cut back into the loop to the extent you think is fair and tell her that if she goes back on the agreement or oversteps her boundaries you'll do it again.

In life if you do not properly establish your boundaries, and adequately defend them you will be walked all over and owned...Overbearing parents tend to never really recognize their children as adults until their kids throw their weight around within their legal rights or they stop caring about their kids... I'd look over the law on that disability stuff and see if there is a way to cut her out of the loop on that too, or a good way to get off disability entirely so she no longer has a monetary leash to jerk you around with.

I would but with me working a job right now that pays just a little above minimum wage I really can't afford a good lawyer. And actually I am on disability because I do actually have a disability and its the only way I could afford to pay the rent at the place I'm living at right now. Its the state of Indiana that's being the douchebags by forcing me to make my mom rep. payee in order to move out of the house, which really its none of the state's business whether or not I'm living with my parents or not, because my mom isn't even my legal guardian anymore because I'm an emancipated adult, if I was a child it would be one thing but an adult?! I think the state has their priorities mixed up.

But anyways there was a listing for another VCR like mine on ebay that said that the guy was willing to take parts out of the unit for whatever you needed in order to save on shipping costs, which seems like that would be a better alternative, but I'm not really sure what this gear is called that I need in order for the guy to know what I'm talking about so I would get the correct part.

The half-load arm is a simple fix, but that plastic load gear can be a pain to replace (some are buried within under IC boards). If I can test a Sony deck before buying, I always use a flashlight (penlight, cellphone light) to make sure both tape guide arms wrap the tape around the drum during playback.

Disconnected from a TV, a Sony with a broken load gear will appear to function properly. Playback, RW, FF all "appear" to be okay. You must look inside while a cassette is playing, best seen with a flashlight, to see if the left guide is functioning correctly. If broken, the tape will only half load, the right guide will still work correctly. Another giveaway of a broken gear when disconnected to a TV is the front time display not working. It'll either stay at 00:00 or working intermittently. When connected to a TV, a broken gear Sony will display a picture that totally fails to track properly, just a big scrambled mess, but you will likely still hear perfect audio.

That's the thing when I first bought this VCR from Goodwill about a year and a half ago it worked perfectly it even worked perfectly fine the last time it was used about 2 months ago but when I went to use the VCR about a month ago was when it started acting up, and was when the gear broke.

Well, either way it's only a matter of time with Sonys. Certainly not the best mechanics for longevity. I usually shy away from the brand's VCRs because of that.

OK so I guess I'll just stick with Hitachis, Zeniths and Panasonics for now on, as they seem to be the most reliable.

An Audiokarma member posted in an old thread where I had advised about the gear, that he was able to buy one from "KP Components" in Canada. That's all I know so don't ask me any questions about the gear price or KP Components.

I didn't know they were still available. Last time 10+ years ago when I tried to order a few for stock Sony had discontinued that gear. And toward the end they were expensive about $10, for a little plastic gear and that was dealer cost.

Perhaps the gears that this KP Components company has in stock are NOS Gears that they bought from Sony just before they discontinued them?