johnedward - 2008-10-20 21:53
Hello to all, Am new to collecting. Made a home run 1st purchase 2 weeks ago Akai PM-01 with tuner nearly a 10 condition, WHAT a Brick and Loud wow for 18 bucks my eyes fell out when opened it. I LOVE IT and blue case is like first day out of box. Bought a WM-F10 off ebay from Germany with orig. headphones /belt clip for 98 incl shipping. He claimed good working order.
Arrived today tried radio first will not hold station jumps to another station or fades in and totally out. Tried my new Koss PortaPro was better but still only a second or two on station. Put in cassette upon play motor makes VERY noticeable smooth bearing noise as best tell. (I drag /race cars but god save me from electronic repair never my stick) Used for 45 mins had noticably wow/flutter but not bad and seemed play bit slow... when you hit stop motor winds down slowly over 2-4 seconds making noticeable to me bearing about to fail noise. Unit stopped auto at end of tape. Came back hour later.... push play nothing !!! red light on no movement NO SOUND at all.. my guess dead motor ??? Believe am stuck with it as seller said no return no refund... slime misrepresented unit, cant believe in shipping this could happen,happen was well packaged.
QUESTIONS : I understand without tearing into unit its just a guess but are there parts to fix these ? WHO can I trust and ship it too in US to fix ? Guessestimate to repair ? Unit is cosmetic very good not perfect. Want to use it but with 100 in it will it cost more than 100 to repair back to right ? Is it worth it value wise. My thanks to the Walkman community and helping me shrug off the ipod age.. Hell my Sony WM-3 bought new worked just over 20 years before ghosting out bless its could not kill it heart.
I am addicted to reading about them, research on net and ebay watching now.
Regards JOHN
ps did read several post here on repair hints but did not see anywhere on motor/bearing? mostly about belts and all kinds of problems. Again my thanks for patience and help to total newbee. PS I do know these models tend on fragile side but am sure if treated well they should work for long time.
Sad story!
But you better PM DocP, he does know everything about
these walkmans!
Oh yes, welcome to the nice forum!
i've bought and fixed a few and this is what happens alot to me. it will play the best when it is first started if it is bought in running condition. trouble is that most haven't been run in years, usually many years. the more they run the more the old belt stretches and either brakes or stretches to far and gets a bit slack. a new belt is usually needed. it's not been my experience that a motor is totally shot. the more you keep them running with the new belt the better they get. sometimes once you get them open you can manually turn the motor over with your hand until it catches on. i've done it for an hour one time before it started on it's own. i work on my own players only and after a couple of years you can do most of the common repairs yourself. see what other opinions you get from other members...
I've found several old players and often playback becomes poor because belt looses its tension.
So, I dissassemble the player to access the belt and check its condition-if it's worn, I'll replace with a good belt from my spare belts set.
I have a few of these that I have worked on. They are not a very robust unit even when new. I have noticed however most of the ones I worked on had belt issues or the case or chassis gets bent and the drive pulley drags on something. They are a fairly simple unit but very tiny parts to tend with.
thank you all for your great help. This is a wonderful friendly forum. JOHN
