Hi all,

I did a full belt change (5 of them) on my 777 this afternoon. Both of the cassette decks were getting very sluggish at rewinding, so I figured the belts were worn out. The decks would both begin rewinding (not too quickly, either), but as they got near the beginning of the tape they would slow, then just stop, with only a little bit of tape left to rewind. It's almost like they were too "weak" to finish rewinding the tape. Anyone else had this problem with a cassette deck? How did you solve it?

Thanks!

You sure you have the correct belts?  Where did you get them?

I looked up the catalog numbers for the belts from the service manual. I found them from an ebay seller that specializes in belts only.

However, this problem happened with the old belts as well (both decks not fully rewinding tapes). And when I took the old belts off and placed them side-by-side with the new ones, the old belts were noticeably stretched. So I don't think this is a belt-tension issue.

When both tape decks are empty and I push rewind, I can see the spool spinning. It spins for about 2 seconds and clicks off. Same with the other deck. As soon as you put a tape in, though, it will not spin/rewind anymore. Just makes a squealing sound. Fast Forward works fine, and does not click off after 2 seconds. Fast forward also works with a tape in the deck, and will wind a tape all the way to the end.

Is the rewind function supposed to click off after a moment like that? Or is that a separate problem?

I've done a thorough grease & oil lube job on all visible moving parts in the tape deck. No difference.

Sounds like it could be a slipping idler wheel. They sometimes have a rubber tyre on them that can perish or ware.

Seb is bang on....that's exactly what the problem is

Ok, I'll look into it, thanks. Do I need to replace the entire wheel? Or just the rubber tire/band around the outside of the plastic wheel?

How about rubber restorer? How well does that stuff work?

I just clean the outer rubber on the wheel with a cotton bud and spit till the bud shows no marks...dosent hurt to be thourough though...and naturally do both decks,,, you need to take the whole deck out though.... but you use whateaver you feel is best

According to the service manual, the wheel with the rubber band is the "playback gear." I can try cleaning that, but I'm having no problems at all with playback. Just rewind problems. There is another gear/wheel below (the playback gear) in the cassette mechanism called "rewind idler" but there is no rubber band around that one - just plastic teeth, like a regular gear. If the problem is an idler wheel, I would imagine it would be a problem with the rewind idler, but what would go wrong with it? There's no rubber band on it to wear out.

The rubber wheel you need to clean is at the back of the deck behind the eletronic board.... hope this helps....you need to take the whole deck out and strip it down the same as if you had to change the belts,,,,i know this is a pain since you have already done this to change the belts

It worked! I stripped the deck down and thoroughly cleaned the 4 idler wheels and then used rubber rejuvenator on them. Both decks rewinding fully now. Thank you so much.

Now:

I was having the same problem with my Rising 20/20, so I figured I'd try the same methods to fix it - cleaning the idler wheel & using rubber rejuvenator. No luck, though. In this instance, it really does appear to be a belt issue. I've replaced all 3 - both cassette belts (an approx 8.5" flat belt and a smaller 5" square belt) as well as the belt for the tape counter (also a 5" square belt). I bought slightly smaller belts to account for stretching (8.4" and 4.8"). But no matter what size replacement belt I use, they seem too "tight". The tape will start to rewind, but slow and eventually stop before it reaches the beginning. I've found when I completely remove the tape counter belt, rewinding resumes strongly, as normal. When I put the old 5" belts back on, they slip on the wheels (both the tape counter & tape deck belts slip). It can't possibly be that this deck is so sensitive that they need 4.9" belts, can it? It just seems like there is some other problem at play.

I know the obvious answer is: "just leave the tape counter belt off and use it as-is," but I'd really like to have it working all properly.

hi if you clean the roller assy rwd fwd and also the capstan flywheel where idlers engage with isopropyl liquid then shoulod be fine.this is a common problem with this type of deck.