Sony SL-C7UB Betamax player repairs

[nethesem]

Hi everyone, I've got a Sony SL-C7UB deck and I've been looking around for some advice on getting a clear-ish picture out of it.

Background- I'm a computer repair shop and out of professional curiosity, I agreed to attempt head cleaning on this Betamax player for an aged gentleman looking to recover a load of family videos he has on Beta. The stakes are fairly low on this, I promised nothing and made him aware that this wasn't my area of expertise.

Here's an example of what I'm dealing with:



Capture setup: Betamax AV out -> AV CVBS to HDMI upscaler -> Elgato Game Capture HD -> Open Broadcaster

I've read about replacing some of the caps and ICs in the device, and I'm experienced with soldering and component-level diagnostics - but I don't know where to start with this.

I have already attempted to clean the heads with isopropyl, I dampened a paper towel with IPA, held it against the head and manually rotated the drum being careful not to move up and down. There was no visible difference.

Do you guys think this can be salvaged?
Thanks for your time!

[JVRaines]

Please don't use paper towel or cotton swabs on the drum. You risk snagging the delicate video heads and leaving debris behind. Instead, use blank, smooth paper or a chamois swab.

It's fine to use cotton swabs and IPA on the rest of the tape path, however. So clean everything else that the tape comes into contact with. Also check the condition of the rubber pinch roller. It should be smooth and firm with a bit of give; if it is hardened or sticky, it needs to be replaced.

The mechanics come before the electronics in a tape machine, so I would first suspect a tape handling problem. The motion of the tape though the transport should be perfectly steady and smooth, so that it appears the tape isn't even moving. If the tape is riding up and down, or jerking, or not perfectly centered on the guides then you need to make adjustments.

It is also possible that the tape is undergoing binder degradation and sticking in the mechanism. This can usually be corrected by "baking" (which Google). In this case, you will also need to clean the tape guides inside the cassette housing or move the tape to a new shell.

If you don't find a problem in the mechanics, then you can put your electronics expertise to use. You know where to start — the power supply voltages. Of course you will need the service manual.

[johnmeyer]

+1 JVRaines

1. Make sure to use 100% isopropyl alcohol; the 90% stuff (or lower) has too much water and will damage the heads.
2. Use flat chamois swabs; definitely not cotton, and not even the round chamois "sticks."
3. Watch a few head cleaning videos on YouTube to learn the technique.

Also, if you've re-capped computer power supplies, you know what bad caps usually (although not always) look like. You also know the symptoms: in a switching power supply, bad capacitors usually reach a point where the supply either becomes intermittent or won't start at all because the "flyback" won't start. Unlike an analog power supply, where bad caps will increase ripple, but still give you roughly the correct voltage (you start getting a lot of hum), when switchmode caps go bad, the supply simply doesn't work. And, as JVRaines said, you can easily and quickly check the voltages. Even without a service manual, most equipment has TPs silkscreened on the circuit board and you can easily test at those points.

It could be bad tape. Does he have access to any other batch of tapes? I can't remember exactly when the 1970s and early 1980s bad tape binder issue happened, and which tapes were affected. It was caused by a bad formulation that got used for many years and is somewhat analogous to the defective manufacturing process uses for electrolytic capacitors that got put into switching power supplies in the early 1990s. It was bad manufacturing that caused so many switchmode power supplies of that era have to be re-capped while, by contrast, older power supplies are still working just fine (although most people don't use their IBM AT computers anymore!).

If it is the equipment, this looks to me like either a head clog or something to do with the tape handling mechanism. Rubber is the thing that kills phonographs, reel-to-reel tape, cassette tape, and VCR machines. Clean the entire tape path (there are several really good YouTube videos that show you how to do this) using that 100% isopropyl alcohol and a professional-grade cotton swab (the cotton is spun tight and doesn't shed). Then, if you suspect a particular roller has become too hard to grip, you can purchase some "rubber rejuvinator" and use that. Make sure to carefully wipe off any residue after you use it, and don't use it if you don't think it is needed. It will not create a permanent fix, but you can often restore enough pliability to the rubber to get the thing to work for a few days, long enough to transfer a batch of tapes.

[Seeker47]

I was interested in having some repairs done for a couple of Beta decks, but am not sure if this is still possible, or where to turn. (And parts at this point could be a major problem. Many years ago, I would sometimes use a regional Sony Service Center -- with middling results. Today, I think they would be at a loss when it came to doing any work on these models, if you sought them out.) These were better model decks, and worth fixing if they could be fixed -- particularly if you had a large Beta collection, much of it never transferred.

There used to be a Beta specialist shop somewhere in Maryland (?). I don't know if they are still in business, and the last I heard they may have had some adverse reports with BBB. (Not sure about that either.) Then there was Southern Advantage in Georgia, which sold and claimed to be able to repair a wide array of older decks. They were active on eBay. No recent info on them. I probably asked orsetto about any resources in NYC. Have to go back to check old emails, but I don't think he had any promising news for me on that front. The techs who did such work may have retired by now.

There once was a guy in central or Northern Calif. who had a good reputation for doing Beta repairs. Would have to go back through a lot of old stuff to find his name. Some years back I tried to contact him, but the trail had gone cold.

Finally, I had put together a list of old Beta repair "leads" that I think were assembled from posts in newsgroups. Some of those were from the Midwest. But that was kind of hearsay info anyway, and is now well over 10 years old. I thought they must be real longshots, and did not seriously get around to following up on them. If anyone has some good, verifiable leads to pursue, I'm still interested.

[lingyi]

Here's a link various Betamax sites: http://www.betainfoguide.net/Betalinks.htm Some, probably most of the links are down, but http://www.palsite.com/home.html is still up and a good resource.

In the U.S., there's mrbetamax.com. The site has been around a long time and there's lots of info (including troubleshooting guides) and he sells refurbished NTSC only Betamaxes. I haven't used him myself, but I did inquire once about having my 20th Anniversary Betamax repaired and he said if I was willing to ship it to him, he's give me an estimate on repair. He also sell refurbished Betamaxes including the legendary EDV-9500 (ED Beta). *SIGH*

Sadly my Betaphile days are gone...but good luck to those who still have and love them!

[johnmeyer]

I send all my repairs to Doctor Sony, a division of A-Tech Systems in NJ. They specialize in Sony equipment (I think that almost all Betamax decks were Sony), but work on other brands as well.

This spring I had them repair a 1986 Sony 8mm deck (not camcorder), which shows that they are comfortable with older equipment. They were able to find parts for it, so they are pretty well plugged in to the various backwaters that still stock NOS parts.

Two hours ago I received from them my Sony CX700 camcorder. They repaired its broken hinge. It was an expensive repair ($149, mostly labor) but I totally understand that charge because I partially disassembled the camera in order to fix it myself until I realized that to fix it, you'd have to take the camera apart almost completely (I saw a YouTube video that confirmed this). It would have taken me hours to do that.

I've now had them repair four different camcorders and decks, and each time they did a good job. Be aware, however, that they have at least a one-month backlog.

[Seeker47]

I send all my repairs to Doctor Sony, a division of A-Tech Systems in NJ. They specialize in Sony equipment (I think that almost all Betamax decks were Sony), but work on other brands as well.

This spring I had them repair a 1986 Sony 8mm deck (not camcorder), which shows that they are comfortable with older equipment. They were able to find parts for it, so they are pretty well plugged in to the various backwaters that still stock NOS parts.

Two hours ago I received from them my Sony CX700 camcorder. They repaired its broken hinge. It was an expensive repair ($149, mostly labor) but I totally understand that charge because I partially disassembled the camera in order to fix it myself until I realized that to fix it, you'd have to take the camera apart almost completely (I saw a YouTube video that confirmed this). It would have taken me hours to do that.

I've now had them repair four different camcorders and decks, and each time they did a good job. Be aware, however, that they have at least a one-month backlog.

Thanks for that. Sounds like a good tip that will be up to date and useful.

I think Mr. Betamax may have been the shop in Maryland. (?)

A few other mfr.s besides Sony made Beta decks. Years ago, I had one that was a lower-middle model, with a wired remote (!), that might have been made by a Korean company. Can't recall now. (No, wait -- it was Sanyo.] It was pretty reliable, for several years. I think Sears rebranded some Beta decks, and there were others.

The upper models that could record and play back 'High Band' B1s could yield results superior to any SVHS I ever saw.

[After the initial read, I noticed that the OP was in the U.K., and of course their deck models were different ones, and for PAL. They likely would have had a higher res than ours, too. Nevertheless, I think this later info in the thread will be helpful for any owners still around in the U.S.]

If I could draw a small analogy, it was my hope that since there are repairs -- and cannibalized, or even re-manufactured parts -- available for pinball machines that are 40+ years old now, that perhaps something similar could have happened for Beta. Not necessarily easy to track down, but that's where these enthusiast forums come to the rescue !