Help..my casette player just acted up on me.when i select the "tape" a humming sound comes from the right speaker.when i hold down the "edit" button it goes away.. any ideas.......

needs new capacitors...common problem...sell it to me if your in UK

long way from U.K. thanks for the info though.these capactors.are they easy to come by??

you could donate it to charity,i know a good one,the beanie man trust fund..

just got this on ebay a month ago.paid 400.00 for it .other then the casette problem the radio is in very good shape..

So .. which caps are we talking about here? Got the same box with the same problem. Tuner is working fine ..

And as a return for the help i'd like to share the GF-9696 service manual with y'all

It looks like a dirty/corroded contacts problem.
First of all you need to spray contact cleaner into all of switches and potentiometers. It should help.

But remember, the best way to eliminate this problem for another 10-20 years - to unsolder, dismantle and clean, then lube all of contacts of all of switches, this is what professional restorers do.

The first way will work of course, but noone can guarantee how long it will last, but it definitely works.

good stuff, check this out - ACF-50

http://www.derbyaeroclub.com/ACF50Anticorrosion.html

http://www.skygeek.com/10013.html

Dankaholic, I don't know is it possible to get ACF-50 in Germany or not, but Cramolin products do the job.

i agree one good cleaning might help it.

Well thanks! No new capacitors - that sounds like good news. BTW from the inside it looks really decent except some dust, it's in good shape and never got opened before. I should be able to get that ACF here.

So everything that goes to the outside world needs to be cleaned right? What about davebush being so sure it's the capacitors?

Situation is:
- Radio working fine
- When switching to 'tape' it sometimes makes some strange noises (humming getting louder with time or some high-pitched tone), pressing 'record' and then 'stop' fixes it for a sec.

Thanks again
danky

You're welcome,

Not everything that goes outside should be cleaned, one of the most common problems is the rec/play switch, which is deeply inside - on the main board, behind the tape mechanism.
Cleaning of all contacts is the very first step in restoration, even they are inside of the switch or the unit itself, cause they are made of copper and oxidize with time.

Also contacts and potentiometeres have been lubricated, and the lube helps a lot, to accumulate the dust, especially, on the top mounted switches and controls. With time this dust and lube turn into ugly grease, and affects electric signal, causing problems described in the first message.

The sympthoms you describe in the last reply are a bit different, and it might be another problem - r/p cable, and it's solder joints, check this thread out:

index.php?board_oid=193392314111653483&content_oid=219993043169433514

Good luck.

Ok, I gave it a good cleaning, put tons of WD40 into the switches and the strange noises disappeared. The VU's act well except in tape selector 'normal' mode they are at max all the time ....

In this thread member ThaToken has been talking about the sounds of silence of the 9696. I even get a noise when it's plugged in but switched off. It's very quiet but it's there! Does anybody have some knowledge about exchanging 'the crappy 6dB original crossover network' with some 'selfmade second order Bessel'? I'll try to contact him but it doesn't seem he's coming to the forum anymore ..

Hi dankaholic,

I'd be careful about WD-40 in the switches. It's more of a moisture displacement than a true lube. It's more likely to attract more dirt and grime with WD-40.

I believe it's more to do with oxidization of the switches. Try an electrical contact cleaner that specifically mention oxidation removal.

Just my 2 cents...good luck!

Sorry, but it's a very bad idea to use WD-40 in that case.

as Brutus said it may cause more grime, and also it's not friendly to rubber and some sorts of plastics.

Thanks for the replies. Thank God I was exxagerating when i wrote about having put tons in there .. But I will clean that out! Any ideas about the noise? Thanks again!!

Update: I cleaned switches right this time (i now know why that oily WD40 is not so good ) also opened and cleaned the rec-pb switch. So those who already did this know that it's a little bit of work. From what i saw so far in this box everything is really clean (especially now that the WD40 is gone ). So I put it back together and turned it on. And again it's acting funky!! (<-- I'm not sure if this is the right emoticon - what is it supposed to mean anyway?!) I have a video attached.

Symptoms today:

- Radio working fine

- Tape has a strong noise, when pressing Play you can hear the music in the background noise changes slightly when pressing rew/ff, disappears during Record

- Phono has the same noise as Tape, only quieter

Cheers!

that definately sounds like the internal record switch is dirty,give it a spray with contact cleaner,like servisol..

in the meantime,get a cassette that your not bothered about,put it in the deck,then press record,then stop,record,then stop,do it a few times,and see if the pipping stops..

i got a 9696 that had the cap problem,but it hummed,and it hummed on all functions,even the radio..i changed the cap and it cured it..

It could be cold solder joint, dead capacitor, etc, in the pre-amp section, if you don't know how to find such a fault, you need a technician.

Metad - you were right!! But it was one of the small solder joints of the rec/pb switch (which i treated yesterday ) the solder was touching the neighbour solder ........ So I fixed that and after having a short battle with the auto-stop-mechanism on the way back i had a working box again!

Now there is still a little something with the tape transport that I'm not happy about. Somehow the flywheel-pinchroller mechanism makes the tape go back and forth every two turns of the pinchroller. On some tapes you can hardly hear it but on one it was really worse and the tape was almost driven behind the guide roller:

This phenomenon occurs between the pb head and the pinchroller. I think the head can be left out as there is not much to adjust. The pinchroller was very slick so I gave it a good sandpaper treatment until it was all black again (did a little bit more on the edges) but nothing changed. The capstan is clean. So does anyone have an idea what else could be done?! It MUST be pinchroller/flywheel, right? In the manual i read something about flywheel thrust clearance adjustment. Could this have an effect? Thanks!!

It could be rubber pulley problem, check it,

if this thing turned into goo, give a good clean to the capstan and bushing, then replace with the new one.

This is what it looks like

Hey

Rubber seems to look good:

So what you're assuming - there are some slight differences in speed of transport after the pb head?! Ok - I thought there was just something being uneven. Maybe I should check the guts of the whole cassette mechanism to see if there's something in there? But it's always such a puzzle to get that stuff together again (I have experience from the 8989/777 mechanism). But the deeper i get into this box the more i enjoy how well built it is, so much metal in the cassette mechanism IMO its much more solid than the 777 ..

From what you have told, it looks like not enough torque for tape movement.

It depends on few reasons, and as you may know it's very hard, sometimes impossible, to find the mechanical fault via internet. LOL.

So there is the only way - to spend some time, watching the mechanism while it's playing in every mode, and you will find the answer.

This is a sort of quest game, but lot of fun.

The last picture shows... the mechanism needs a very good clean.
As I said before, the first step is cleaning.
You just have to pass this point, to move forward.

And I agree, it's more solid box than GF-777, even the tape mechanism chassis is plastic.

Yeah I know, the more I mess around with these boxes the more i get a more buddhistic view of it. It will be repairing always, it's never finished. But it wouldn't be a true hobby if it made sense ..

Tomorrow work is starting again so I'll get me some new belts and get the tape mechanism going in the next session. Thanks so much for your advice!!

Cheers!

Oh no, everything makes sense

wow great pics metad, i also had one 9696 with the same melted rubber tire.