Tape-to-Tape Walkman ('Repair' video)
Here's a nice simple video to make your mid-week that little bit brighter.
Repair videos are satisfying to make (sometimes) - however a lot of the work takes place off-screen, in the editing. Taking something apart whilst also keeping it in shot, well lit and in focus is also particularly tricky. Shooting in 4K helps with this, as I can frame things with a wide angle, then crop in on the video during the editing to focus in on the important section of the frame without sacrificing too much quality.
This video was shot across a two week period (whilst I was waiting for parts) and also generated a few hours of footage - somewhere around 70GB of video..which then needed to be edited down within an inch of its life to make the end result as snappy as possible. Making things look simple is often quite complicated.
I hope you enjoy the video and as always thanks for your continued support.
Comments (19)
Nice one! Maybe I'll try to repair one of my two Sony DD walkmans. But they are direct drive, and probably don't have a belt...
Unfortunately I guess your DDs are making the click of death...the sound that signifies that the centre cog has cracked. It happens to all the DDs and is very tricky to fix. If you do a bit of reading up on 'cracked centre gear walkman' it will probably put you off the idea...it did me.
Ah, 'Walkman' memories :) My last one, a beautiful little 1980s Aiwa, is in a box somewhere with a loose red button, if I recall, and no doubt a strip of sticky black paste for a belt. At the time, it made long haul flights a little more bearable in an era before seat-back screens and on-demand entertainment. After watching your near-successful repair, I'm encouraged to at least see if I can find my old Aiwa and maybe loosen a screw or two.
Thats good news...what's the worst that could happen.
So satisfying to watch this :) I've always wondered where does the batteries goes in this, but never looked it up on the net. Also my instant thought after the video was: are there any other portable device combos made around the same idea, like Discman's which can record, or Minidisc-Discman combos? But seems to be I'm out of luck.
I wondered the same thing about the batteries. I was on the verge of looking for an online manual before I figured it out. I'd imagine it's the only walkman that holds the batteries underneath the top cowling.
"...And the niche market award goes to: The Slovokian 80's-90's cassette Walkman custom replacement belt guy."
You know what...it's so nice to be able to have a sensible discussion here. It's like a breath of fresh air, akin to a late 1990s forum, before smartphones. Back when booting up a PC and connecting to the internet took more time and effort than lighting a wood fire, so when you finally got online you made the most of it.
Found a dusty twin tape deck record player in my parents attic..I knew off the bat it would require a belt for the turntable, but after plugging it in I got the same issue as you, the heads don't turn but you can hear the motor working in the background. Sadly I don't have the time to strip it down and get it working again. Maybe one day I will give it a go, otherwise it'll be going in the skip.
phil, i've had luck with a guy in blackpool called gethteneedle.co.uk loads of help and advice to get my dansette bermuda up ad running
I know the pain all too well of trying to video a repair job. It makes it take 2 or 3 times longer than it would otherwise. I also know the pain of dealing with belts. I have seen several repair videos where you have replaced a belt and got something working again. However, I have had nothing but trouble and frustration when I have tried to replace belts. I can never find the right one and I have like 3 unfinished videos because I was never able to find a replacement belt for various devices.
There's a good deal of jeopardy involved. At the start you have no idea whether you'll end up being succesful or not...so there's a very good possibility that it will all end up being for nothing. As I was making this I was thinking about James May's TV show The Reassembler, where he has a team of camera people capturing the best angle while he concentrates on reassembling a device that he knows will work when he's finished. This was a cheaper more amateurish version but with an unpredictable outcome.
Laskys!
My mates and I totally did the spectrum game run on a Friday afternoon after school to the local shop - we would starve ourselves all week living on a mars bar for lunch, walk to school and pocket the bus fare and chuck the pocket money in. All buy a game and then go back to the nearest house and I usually got the job of recording all the games so everyone had them. (I didn't feel guilty, we were putting every single spare penny we had into the industry)! Thx for the nostalgia rush there. :)
Unfortunately I didn't have any friends who were into games...but I'd spend every pence of my £3 a week pocket money on Speccy games. I'm quite sure I spent more time loading some of them than I did playing them...but those were still great times.
Wow! I can vaguely remember looking in the Argos catalogues at devices like this, and dreaming of what I'd own if I had the money. (At the time, of course, I didn't). Aside from the original asking price, I would imagine the record companies weren't too fond of the idea of a Walkman that could copy tapes, so not surprised that this wasn't on the market for long.
I don't know if these were sold worldwide...but you're right, based on what we know regarding the RIAA's opposition to any recording device, I can't imagine the reception in the US would have been with open arms.
Really enjoyed that. I used to be a computer engineer, fixing all kinds of printers and stuff, but I'm still not sure I'd tackle one of those, I know there would be a Ping! and something would fly past my ear that I wouldn't be able to find
I was expecting it to be like defusing a bomb full of tiny springs, so was pleasantly surprised, perhaps I was overthinking things.