Isopropyl Alcohol (my bottle says 91% but it’s been refilled with 99%. You can use any concentration, but more is better and I recommend at least 90%) White Lithium Grease Rubber Rejuvenator Cotton buds Demagnetizing Wand
To begin with you will need to disassemble your camera. If you have not already done so then follow the guide here: https://pxl2k.com/first-disassembly/
If you’re doing this, you probably want to change the belts if you haven’t already. Find that guide here: https://pxl2k.com/change-belts/
Left is the erase head, middle is the playback and record head, on the right is the rubber pinch roller and the capstan, which is the metal cylinder it contacts. We need to clean all 3 of these things, and we will restore the rubber on the pinch roller.
Keep an eye out for flat spots on the pinch roller, as seen in the picture above. This will definitely need to be reconditioned in order to get it to function properly, otherwise the flat spot will increase wow and flutter.
Apply some isopropyl alcohol to a q tip and rub down the playback and erase head. Do this until all smudges and brown spots come off.
If you have an auto-stop PXL then you will also need to clean the auto stop lever, seen here. If you do not have an auto-stop PXL ignore this step, you will not have this extra lever.
Before and after cleaning the erase head.
In order to clean the pinch roller we will activate the mechanism outside of the case. To do this you need only press down on the play button hold switch and press in the play button.
If ever you wanted to test the camera function you’ll need to also push in the record button hold switch, but to clean it all we need is the play button.
Now plug in your unit. It will power on and begin turning the pinch wheel and capstan. This will make cleaning them much easier. Be very careful at this stage so as not to cross connect any electrical points on the circuit board. Do not touch any circuitry while the unit is powered on in this state.
Wet some q tips with isopropyl alcohol and start cleaning the pinch roller. Slowly rotate the q tip clockwise while you do this. You want to place the q tip on the top of the pinch roller, to the right of the capstan, otherwise the capstan will constantly pull cotton fibers from the bud into the mechanism.
You really want to spend a good amount of time on this. Although the pinch roller likely does not appear very dirty, I assure you it needs much more cleaning than it may first appear. You can see from my expended q tips just how much crud came off one, mostly clean looking pinch roller.
The goal is to get as much crud off the pinch roller as humanly possible. Otherwise, if you attempt to recondition the rubber (as seen in the next step) with dirt and crud still on the roller you risk deforming the shape.
As a final move run the cotton bud along the capstan. It is likely already clean by all the time you’ve spent on the pinch roller but it is good practice to rub everything down.
This is rubber Rejuvenator. It is VERY caustic stuff. Use in a well ventilated area. It is harsh, but it will make a very large difference in the performance of your cassette deck. It breaks down and removes the outer layer of rubber, so we really need to be careful with how much we use.
You only need a SMALL amount. I spray some on a q tip, rotating the q tip as I do so, then slowly rotate it along the pinch roller. You can see the color difference in residue pretty clearly in this image. You want to do this until the rubber looks matte and dull. The goal is to remove all the shiny spots from the surface. You should only need one q tip for this job. Use a clean tip to dry the roller, don’t let the chemical sit on the surface.
Here, you can see a stark difference between cleaning products. The rubber restorer really does an amazing job of improving performance.
Now we need to lubricate the gears. This will help extend the life of the unit, and also quiet down the mechanism during operation.
I did a lot of research on the subject as to which lubricant you should use. The best consensus I could find is that white lithium grease is ideal for plastic gears.
Plug in your unit and activate the mechanism as before. Shake up your grease (no really, don’t forget to shake it up), and place some on the end of a cut off q tip. Use this to apply lubricant in between where the gears mesh together. You only need a small amount of lubricant. If grease is flinging everywhere you’re using too much. You only need just enough to coat the gears.
Make sure you do this with all gear meshes. Don’t forget to put the unit into rewind and lubricate those gear meshes as well.
I noticed that my mechanism quieted down after going out and doing several shoots with a couple tapes. If you wanted this performance before you go out to shoot then I’d recommend playing a few tapes through it, otherwise you can use it as normal and the mechanism should quiet down after a little bit of use.
Lastly we’re going to demagnetize the mechanism. There’s a lot of conflicting information as to whether this step is strictly necessary or not, but one thing I know for certain is that if you do it right it certainly doesn’t hurt anything, so we’re going to go ahead and do it while we’ve got this camera apart. You can skip it if you wish, but a demag wand is only like $25-30, which isn’t much for peace of mind. You can find them online easily.
My process is probably way overkill, but I know it works so I just go with it.
To begin with, MAKE ABSOLUTE CERTAIN you do not have any cassette tapes, magnetic media, or other magnetically sensitive objects near you while you do this.
Begin with the mechanism across the room, and the wand on the other side, near a power outlet. Plug in the wand. SLOWLY, move the wand towards the center of the room. SLOWLY move the mechanism towards the wand.
Once the wand and mechanism are in proximity, begin by moving the wand in small circles around the entire mechanism. You will feel the magnetic pull in the handle of the wand. It’s a unique feeling, you will know it is working.
Focus the rubber tip around the tape head specifically, but make sure to move it around all metal parts on the mechanism.
Once you’ve taken a couple minutes to run over the mechanism then SLOWLY move the mechanism away from the wand. SLOWLY move the wand away from the middle of the room. THEN AND ONLY THEN should you unplug the wand.
If you do not follow these steps in this order you risk permanently magnetizing your deck. One thing you absolutely do not want to happen is for the wand to become unplugged or turned off when in proximity of the mechanism. So when you do this, make certain there are no other people or animals around to trip on the cable, and it’s probably best not to do this during a thunderstorm when your power might go out. Take it slow, read these instructions several times and you will have no problems.
