My JVC 7800 stops and turns off during playback

[audioflyer]

I recently bought a JVC 7800 VHS which was advertised as in excellent condition and recently professionally cleaned. It has worked fine so far, and I captured the first half of a tape with no issues. However, towards the end of the tape, the program material switches from SP to EP, and from that point on, it will not play for more than 5-10 seconds without stopping and turning itself off. It will allow me to fast forward through that section, even in the "play+FF" mode, but once I hit play it will stop itself within a few seconds. Can anyone tell me what causes this?

Thanks!

Ryan

[juhok]

I had a similar symptoms with SP tapes (shutdown in the middle of playback, more often towards the end of the tape) and it turned out that the grease in 'capstan bearings' had turned into very sticky stuff over time and needed cleaning and new grease. This unit had also been serviced just prior this - service people don't check out every possible fault. If there's no obvious malfunction they often just clean and maybe even calibrate the unit. Your problem might be something quite else, but this powering down stuff is more than tracking problems(but if every other tape works fine, who knows ).

[lordsmurf]

This may be an issue with the tape itself. I've had to dismantle and then re-spool it. I think I've talked about this in some threads at http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum in the past. There's just no other way to get around this, when the tape is at fault. All those tricks some folks use, like FF/REW the tape, often damages it further or doesn't help any.

[audioflyer]

Thanks! I'll try some other tapes first, and that should tell me if the tape or player are at fault.

In case anyone is curious, I'm going JVC HR-S7800 via S-video into a Canopus ADVC110, into a Macbook, capturing with a program called Vidi, then importing to iMovie. Working like a champ so far. I've been really impressed by how much of a difference the TBC on the JVC unit makes on these old tapes. They are almost unwatchable without it.

Thanks again for the help.

[audioflyer]

The issue does seem to be tape-dependant. I have since taken the top off the unit and cleaned the tape path, and now I can see what is happening inside the unit when it does the stop playing-auto power down. The take-up reel (right side) simply stops turning and the tape starts to back up a few inches and form a loop right after the capstan, since it is not being taken up by the reel. Again, it only happens on a few tapes, both SP and EP, but it seems to be mostly EP. Does this sound like capstan bearings? The issue seems to be AFTER the capstan, with the turning of the take-up reel. Sorry if "take-up reel" is not the proper term, I come from a reel-to-reel audio recording background.

Any suggestions?

[audioflyer]

I ended up coming up with a "low tech" solution to the issue. I broke out the clear window above the take-up reel on one VHS cassette, and now whenever I have a tape with this issue, I swap cassette shells so that I can use my finger to manually advance the reel if it stops turning. Not the ideal solution, but it works well enough for me to capture the tape, then I swap the shells back.

I'd still like to know if anyone else has seen this issue, or knows what it might be.