I bought a NOS GE Silhouette which didn't come with the AC adapter in the box. It does have a 6V barrel input which I attached to my bench power supply but the unit won't play a tape. There is a little LED for a battery indicator but I don't know if it's supposed to illuminate with DC connected. I opened it up and it looks flawless inside. No leaking caps and the drive belt looks to be in good working order. When I click the "play" button, the cassette wheel does try to spin, moving ever so slightly before stopping. But that's the most life I could get out of it. When I connect the power to the cassette player from my bench supply, the voltage drops from 6V to 2V at 2A. The bottom of the player says that it needs 5W. My power supply is rated for 3A so it should be able to drive this. Does anyone know what might be causing my cassette player to fail?
I found a later model (GE 3-5027A) which is also 6V but indicates the polarity is in fact center negative. I swapped this around and the player now plays a cassette when powered from from my bench supply. But the audio isn't right. It will fade out to something very quiet on its own, despite the volume being set to full. Lifting the player up and tilting it or applying pressure to the sides will sometimes cause the volume to change. What could this next problem be? The cassette I am trying to play is brand new (sealed in plastic) and the felt pad inside is in excellent condition.
I was going to say check polarity before I saw your second post, I'd get screaming deals on Casio Keyboards because they always had theirs different than the other brands. Also gooey belts will really make things turn slow. Are you getting sound from the headphone jack? Before I start taking boxes apart I always DeOxit the volume and AM/FM selector knob. The selector knob, with detents, actually causes a ton of different issues for boxes but I don't think your recorder has a similar switch.
I disassembled the unit and found the problem to be some kind of slider switch which is controlled by the record button. There is a small metal lever that fits inside the end of this slider (where the hole is) and moves it inwards when the record button is set. The problem is that it seems to be making a poor connection internally; even the slightest movement can cause it to shift enough that it will disrupt the audio. Is there any way to obtain a replacement part for this? The unit was NOS so I just have been very unlucky. Or perhaps there is something about it that just didn't hold up with age.
Try cleaning that switch with some cleaner spray. These record/playback switches are usually, apart form the belts, the first thing to check and clean before looking for problems elsewhere.
I ordered some DeoxIt FaderLube,which seemed the correct product for this use case. Will report back.
Two of those solder joints looks "broken" on the backside photo, I'd take a magnifying glass and wiggle the switch and see if there movement with the pins.
You're right that they look broken. I examined them under my microscope and poked at then with a tool. The joints are good. The black part that looks like a shadow on one of the pins was some black gunk that flaked off. There is a lot of leftover flux on the board. Good eye, though. It wasn't visible to me by just looking at it and I didn't catch it from the photo.
I really like a good camera, you can see a lot more with good light and magnification. Sometimes you can clean off the switches by moving them a lot, using the contact cleaners is much better, but rapid movement may work short term and give you an idea if that's the issue. I've pulled similar switches apart and transplanted parts before, we have a local store called AxeMan that has tons of old switches and parts that I've used but I usually have to get a bag full to find one that fits right, luckily that's just a few dollars.
