I bought this Sharp 9494 as "completely working" the words completely working to me mean "everything works and no problems". Got it home stuck a tape in it, and it would play for about 20 seconds before the tapes got chewed up and snapped. I needed to take it apart to give it the once over anyway so thought it would probably just be bands (how wrong I was !) . Also cosmetically the speakers looked bad, everything was caped in dust, but most worrying was some kind of solvent that had actually eaten into the clear plastic window near the VU meters. These are the before pictures you can see the solvent burn better in the second picture.

Once it was apart I was really pleased at how easy the bands seemed to be to change (thinking that would sort the playing issues out). I then masked up the plastic trim with some sellotape and started to rub the solvent pitting out with some 1200 wet and dry to then return it to a "spanky clear finnish" . I have found that you can get any scratches out of clear plastic using a product called "Hind Sight" it is a convertible car rear window restorer it is excellent!. I spent a good 45 minutes wet and drying all the pitting out then applied the Hind Sight plastic restorer. While I was waiting for the plastic restorer to dry I cleaned all of the switches with Circuit board cleaner (pure alcohol )

Once the plastic had been restored I then moved onto the badly stained speakers, I took the Grills off scrubbed them in the sink both sides with a brush and some soap, pushed all the dents out with a wooden sanding block, and then put silicon spray on them. They came up like new after. Then I cleaned all of the speakers with Alcohol giving them a really good scrub to get as much as the staining out as possible. I also did this to all the chrome work behind the speakers.

Good tip on the clear plastic restorer!

Hate solvent burn

Sounds like the usual Sharp capstan tyre needed sorting

Hmm! the Sharp capstan tyre, not the finest piece of desighn the wold of tape decks has seen!  Both my 9090 and 9191 sufferd failure of this component. Back when I owned these machines you could still get the part from Sharp! If you search the threads on s2g concerning this problem you will find some some really good ideas on how to fix this.

Once I had cleaned all the speakers up as best as I could I started on all the switches and the trim at the top. They all went into the sink for a soapy scrub then I finished any really bad areas using alcohol and more of the plastic treatment Hindsight. I used a tooth brush to clean the crap out of the switches on the top, then I continued to remove all the visible dust from any components I could see. 

good work mate 

Originally Posted by Northerner:

Hate solvent burn

Sounds like the usual Sharp capstan tyre needed sorting

Hmm! the Sharp capstan tyre, not the finest piece of desighn the wold of tape decks has seen!  Both my 9090 and 9191 sufferd failure of this component. Back when I owned these machines you could still get the part from Sharp! If you search the threads on s2g concerning this problem you will find some some really good ideas on how to fix this.

 aiwa use the same idea with the capstan on there 900 series and i have never had to change them seb.

I put it all back together expecting it to work and to my utter disappointment there were still problems with the tape deck. One of the rubber wheels had literally turned to gum and disintegrated. Not sure what this is called ????? and can you get spare parts ?????. Anyhow I took a 555 breaker apart I bought last week for £8 for a spare and both of those were in exactly the same condition . I found a Plastic lug from the 555 that was made out of that was the correct diameter roughly and had a hole part way through it (albeit to small). I then cut it down, removed and sanded the excess plastic off and started to melt my way through using a lighter on the end of the long piece of metal that comes off the large wheel. It took some patience and some messing around but eventually it went on and it was really tight. I gave it a final sand to ensure it was rough enough for the rubber wheel to pick up on it to drive the play mechanism. I then pushed it back into place and made sure that it would contact the wheel properly. After a few adjustments I was able to put it all back together .

Originally Posted by Seb968:

Originally Posted by Northerner:

Hate solvent burn

Sounds like the usual Sharp capstan tyre needed sorting

Hmm! the Sharp capstan tyre, not the finest piece of desighn the wold of tape decks has seen!  Both my 9090 and 9191 sufferd failure of this component. Back when I owned these machines you could still get the part from Sharp! If you search the threads on s2g concerning this problem you will find some some really good ideas on how to fix this.

 aiwa use the same idea with the capstan on there 900 series and i have never had to change them seb.

Might be that Aiwa use a better grade of rubber. Is the tyre on the Aiwa any bigger than that of the Sharp? (Or it might be that you have been lucky! )

And once I was satisfied the fix would work I then started to put it all back together. Here are the finished pictures of the Box . It was never going to be mint but EVERYTHING now works on it, the speakers look a lot fresher and the tape deck works sweet as a nut. And all the switches look like new, another thing you can do is the silver trim under the switches simply turn all of them over as they are a lot shinier on the underneath as they have not been subject to all the dust etc. As you can see the solvent stain has been completely sanded out and you would never even know it had been there.

That looks fantastic, nice work . I like your fix the capstan tyre. Great post, thanks for sharing!

It's loads better still a bit of staining on one speaker, but all in all I am really pleased with it and currently enjoying listening to a tape on it at the moment . Was the piece I made out of plastic called "The Capstan tyre" ? . If so be great to find an easier way to fix these so will have a read up on how everyone else has done it.

Originally Posted by deliverance:

Originally Posted by Seb968:

Originally Posted by Northerner:

Hate solvent burn

Sounds like the usual Sharp capstan tyre needed sorting

Hmm! the Sharp capstan tyre, not the finest piece of desighn the wold of tape decks has seen!  Both my 9090 and 9191 sufferd failure of this component. Back when I owned these machines you could still get the part from Sharp! If you search the threads on s2g concerning this problem you will find some some really good ideas on how to fix this.

 aiwa use the same idea with the capstan on there 900 series and i have never had to change them seb.

Might be that Aiwa use a better grade of rubber. Is the tyre on the Aiwa any bigger than that of the Sharp? (Or it might be that you have been lucky! )

 they are of similar size the rubber must be better quality on the aiwa .

Originally Posted by Seb968:

Originally Posted by deliverance:

Originally Posted by Seb968:

Originally Posted by Northerner:

Hate solvent burn

Sounds like the usual Sharp capstan tyre needed sorting

Hmm! the Sharp capstan tyre, not the finest piece of desighn the wold of tape decks has seen!  Both my 9090 and 9191 sufferd failure of this component. Back when I owned these machines you could still get the part from Sharp! If you search the threads on s2g concerning this problem you will find some some really good ideas on how to fix this.

 aiwa use the same idea with the capstan on there 900 series and i have never had to change them seb.

Might be that Aiwa use a better grade of rubber. Is the tyre on the Aiwa any bigger than that of the Sharp? (Or it might be that you have been lucky! )

 they are of similar size the rubber must be better quality on the aiwa .

Thanks for the info, thats good to know.

Check your PM Thebaron

great job looks fantastic