Where can you find "How to do preventive Maintenance on a Pioneer 701-RT Reel to Reel?
- Thread starter Joetown
- Start date
You must NOT have bought the Service Manual. Cleaning and lubing should be in there (MAYBE)
I'm doing all that right now on the Sony but the books don't really cover that very well. It's pretty involved and relies on the person doing the services to know what they are doing. Be careful, take pics, and Good Luck. Sometimes it's easier to send it to a specialist.
I'm doing all that right now on the Sony but the books don't really cover that very well. It's pretty involved and relies on the person doing the services to know what they are doing. Be careful, take pics, and Good Luck. Sometimes it's easier to send it to a specialist.
Doing extensive work on decks of this age will be a big task to those that are not used to this kind of work. It take some time to go through the process to get experience on the job. There are no books videos or other instructions I have seen except for the one on one training I do at my shop. Some people Email me with many questions and in the end they do repair the problems they have and some guy calibrate the deck as well buying all the needed equipment. It can be done but I tell people that to buy all this stuff is not wise for one deck- it is cheaper to let a pro do it. IF you want to get into the business then buy and lets get started. I help people get their own business started. There is plenty of work for everyone.
The Tascam 42NB is too new a product to worry about recapping at this time. Maybe in another 15 years there will be occasion to find a common cap problem on them. It seems to me that people do the opposite of what is right. They never want to recap Vietnam era decks and then here comes a 42NB or BR20 and they want to recap those. Lets use logic and some level of predictability of the failure of these parts as too many are wasting time with unnecessary practices. I can not remember a failed cap in a modern Tascam product but have experienced many failed parts in units of questionable component selection. Those would be the poor caps used in Technics RS decks and those that used 10V caps in cassette deck and even the Z7000. I have had these parts short.
In most of the 42 deck I have worked on they needed very minor correction and most of the problems come from people that get under the splicing block to turn tensions with not the proper equipment and then of course the decayed rubber on Tachometer and Pinch Roller. Terry makes easy solutions to this and I always have him do the job. The other thing is they used plastic feet on these heavy decks that are really not up to the task.
Parts Express sells a rubber amplifier foot that even when kicked by accident the Tascam feet would break but the rubber ones stay put. The same rear feet are used on Otari decks as well. The Tascam 40 series decks as well as 50 and 60 are great machines to have and work on.
In most of the 42 deck I have worked on they needed very minor correction and most of the problems come from people that get under the splicing block to turn tensions with not the proper equipment and then of course the decayed rubber on Tachometer and Pinch Roller. Terry makes easy solutions to this and I always have him do the job. The other thing is they used plastic feet on these heavy decks that are really not up to the task.
Parts Express sells a rubber amplifier foot that even when kicked by accident the Tascam feet would break but the rubber ones stay put. The same rear feet are used on Otari decks as well. The Tascam 40 series decks as well as 50 and 60 are great machines to have and work on.
Last edited:
What are you going to lub? Tension rollers are things that might need it and perhaps a oiling of the capstan motor sleeve bearing but that will need to take the motor apart to do it right- one drop of oil at the front usually does nothing for you as the bearings have a void inside that prevents the oil from getting to the second half and 1 or 2 drop is nothing anyway. Most capstan sleeve bearings which are used at the front of the motor in all capstan cases usually need a lot of oil and AMSoil Signature series synthetic oil would be best which is what I have used for a number of years with good results. As for the recapping idea- it is not needed overall but there have been some defective caps found of the Tascam 48 made about the same time. These are the 100uFd and 220uFd Marcon caps that do not seem to age well. When I see them in there they all get replaced with fresh. You can wait for them to short on you but I like to get rid of possible trouble parts and those like 10V caps that have been known to be defective in a lot f different equipment.
Even when the spice block is not missing you are most the time going to have to correct the adjustments in there as idiots that see adjustment just have to turn them and make things better all the time NOT having a Tentelometer which is what is needed to do these adjustments. I have had very few decks come to me where the adjustments were not made a mess of. The internal tension sensor position might have to be done first as you are not suppose to start in the middle of a procedure.
To answer the question put, the maintenance of deck is not usually given in any manual and it is a knowledge of the Technician who has many years of experience with decks that knows what needs to be addessed. There are some things in decks that can be assumed to be bad at this age like Electrolytic caps. Then there are some things unique to the model like the RT-701 and RT-707 have that Molex connector that needs cleaning at times as well as a pitch control. Well when you do the counter belt this is a good time to spray the pitch control and clean and oil a counter. The deck otherwise is a pretty solid unit. Those that you can fix are the ones you want not the one that are very hard to fix like a Concord.
I think on the RT-707 the 2SC1327 transistors have gotten noisy on some decks. I think there are like 8 or 10 altogether. I have put in KSC1845 and have had no problem with the unit I repaired. Now we have a guy who I have been training doing them in SC of the states. Jeff is coming right along. If a person get started and some experience there is work out there and it will come to you when you are ready. I may have 14 or 15 that I have been training.
Well I first did it to get help but that has not happened much except for nakmandan who has helped a lot in cassette decks. I want him to learn Open reels too. Hari my local guy is too busy with restaurant building for some company and so that leave a space open for a person once I get some room again.
Well as I get older I seem to be getting more guys wanting to get into repair business which is good. I have a new trainee here local and then Terry's son who wants to get into repair and then a newer guy who contacted me from Madison WI. Tooling up and getting the right equipment might take time and maybe now $2000 to start. If you become good at repair you can easily make that back in a short time. There are some days that I can make $600 to $1000 per day but at my current physical condition that is not every day and a lot depends on what you are working on. There are challenges all the time- getting parts, making translation plates to put Pioneer heads on a Teac and so on. It is a lot of testing and trial and error plus a little bit of money. I cant wait to get the correct crimp tool from China to make my Tascam 488 Mk II extension cables so these kinds of deck can be worked on more easily. I bet the factory had them but I never saw any which is why I had to spend time with research to find the JST connectors and spent about $100 to get the wire and connectors and pins. The Pins in the female parts need to be crimped with a tool that deal with those real tiny connectors. in the repair business there is not a dull moment.
On the 40 series decks I have found and noticed the problems with a part which I bring to light. These are the 100uFd or 220 uFd Marcon caps I have seen in 48's and others. These must have been a real cheap part as I have found some shorted in a 48 that had a fuse resistor unsolder itself. When I traces where that resistor fed voltage it was a shorted Marcon cap. Many of the caps I measured in that deck going to CT were all over the place indicating that they did not hold up well long term. United Chemicon and Nichicon I have no problems most of the time. I ended up changing out the 16 caps they used on the 8 cards for plus and minus filtering to amp circuits- Some caps were 100K, some 4 Meg which is good and some even between that plus one at 0 ohms. Shouldn't they all read about the same? The new Wurth caps I put in will extend the units life plus they are a nice Red color. Beware that Marcons have been trouble in C-3RX and Tascam 238 as well.
Wurth are German made caps and they are not a problem part as long as I have tested and used them plus I put in 105*C parts most the time which are better than the 85*C parts. You do not have to put Japan parts in all the time and many late Tascam decks say made in Taiwan which is China. You can tell by the construction and design also.
