BPC Tape Decks (from ordinarily respectable names)

Okay, I'd like to start a discussion and see how far it goes. How many of you have seen a BPC (black plastic crap) tape deck come from a normally-reputable manufacturer? Doesn't have to be any particular format, can be cassette, reel-to-reel or whatever.

Here's mine: a Sony TC-FX211 (picture taken prior to cleaning it):



Doesn't look too bad from the front...

I found it today, perched atop a case of cassette tapes in a thrift shop. This was the same shop where I found the NOVA-6 speakers, so I was feeling lucky. Thought I'd take it off their hands and bid them $10 for the cassettes, nice wooden multi-drawer case and the Sony cassette deck. I could see that it had a manual biasing adjustment on the front and figured it would be good. Also visible were indications for normal, chrome and metal tapes, with auto-detection being implied. So what if it's only auto-stop, that's fine with me. I have a TC-W490 dual-well auto-stop-only deck that is quite nice.

I also walked out of there with a Technics SL-BL3 turntable, of which more later (and in the appropriate forum). In the end, I swapped the services of fixing a TV for these pieces.

Got all these things home and the tape transport is running, just way too slowly. Rewind and fast forward are nearly impossible. A-ha! It must be bad belts! I popped the cover and this is what I saw.





If this is the way other modern cassette decks look inside, we're all in trouble. There's nothing missing in that picture--all the working circuitry is right up in the front panel. I've seen Emerson and Soundesign cassette transports that were better made. Date codes seemed to suggest 2003 as a possible date of manufacture?

Getting to the belts and putting them back was a lot of fun. The transport itself has to come out, and to do that isn't so bad. Four screws, one metal bracket and the front door's outer decorative cover have to come off. Then you can eject the cassette basket, unplug the tape-type detection switch connector and carefully pivot the transport out of the unit. This is better than a number of other decks I've been inside, where many stupid tinned, soldered or litz wire connections link the mechanicals to the circuitry.

But you can't get at the motor, as the front is shrouded in plastic. I'm not sure why Sony called this a "DC servo controlled motor". This implies feedback capabilities for speed correction, and there is no such thing going on here--just a simple, cheap Mabuchi DC permanent magnet motor. So...how does the motor come out? It's clear that there are screws driven into the plastic shroud, yet their heads are invisible. It turns out that there is a piece of plastic over the reel table that unscrews and reveals all the gears and workings of the transport itself. Once that's out of the way, you can see the screws holding the motor into place. Those come out and the motor drops away to reveal the pulley. Now you can put a belt on, although it helps to have four hands...one to put the motor back up, one to hold the belt in place so it won't slip off the motor pulley, one to drive the screws in and another to keep the whole transport from going south and probably throwing all manner of gears and little parts everywhere.

For what it's worth, the belts seemed OK to me, so I put them back into place. Maybe one of them was misrouted--it seemed like someone had been into this set before? I put them back into place, put the "table" back into place, put the transport back in and got it to the point where I could test it.

From that point on, it has given the impression of working (meaning that the reels appear to turn at the right speed, and REW/FF operations are much better). There is no full auto-stop capability, only a simple arm that stops the mechanism in play or record mode when the tape pulls taut against it. I thought even the cheapest and nastiest component cassette decks did that?

I've put several garbage cassettes through it and none have been eaten, although I have yet to hook up any amplifiers or speakers.

There are still some problems. A cheap fiber-board looking c-clip is all that appears to hold the capstan and flywheel in place. Mine was broken, so the capstan and flywheel will pull out if given any help. I'm not sure how I'll fix that part. I'd welcome your thoughts.

What I really can't understand is how Sony could "sink" to such a level...no full auto-stop, very cheap design...I would think people looking to buy a Sony product would expect better. I certainly would have.

Why I'd bother fixing it? I guess I just can't help myself. I'll tinker with anything before giving up and sending it to the recycler.

Most manufacturers try to have products in all price categories, from cheap to mid-fi. That is probably Sony entry level deck for the year it was made. I'm sure Sony had a better deck that year.

Pathetic. I'm glad I didn't pick this up at GW. I'd much rather go with Yorx than this POS BPC.

One of those Sony FX-211 decks was one of the first full size decks that I repaired. It was bought in 1995, and it needed attention in 1997.
Problem was that the capstan had disappeared:saywhat:
Was equally surprised when i opened it up to see so little inside.
The problem was, as you noticed earlier, that the flywheel is only held in bu that small c-clip, a tape had been put in upside down, so the force imparted by the mechanical advantage of that situation had popped it out.
Fortunately the clip was in the bottom of the deck.
The belt needed replacing, but I found it easier to replace the belt on it than you seemed to, yes i dropped the motor to do it.
In Australia these decks cost about $179 new, the next model up, with 2 motors and logic control was about $350. So quite a cost difference. Yamaha's base model was about $380. So in fairness the Sony was built to a price, just a very low one!
Also from the same model year I have a Sony CD player, a CDP-213, the first to be made in China by Sony, as with your tape deck, all the circuitry is on the front panel and there is nothing on the base.
For the c-clip, may find one in a junk deck, like from a real BPC item, like a mini-system. Otherwise some parts suppliers have assorted packs. I would suggest looking at studiosoundelectronics.com (or whatever that site is) and looking up technician's aids, they have a kit called AP-1 which may have the correct bit, plus a whole heap of others.
Cheers
Tony

IMHO cassette decks that are sold in Best Buy and other stores made within the past 10 years are very low quality. No 3 heads, full auto stop, HX Pro and even Dolby C on some decks I seen. However, it's been a while since I walked into a Best Buy store.

Wow.
That is pretty sad..

AnalogDigit said:

IMHO cassette decks that are sold in Best Buy and other stores made within the past 10 years are very low quality. No 3 heads, full auto stop, HX Pro and even Dolby C on some decks I seen. However, it's been a while since I walked into a Best Buy store.

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In the last several years of making occasional visits to Best Buy stores (usually once every few months), I haven't seen any cassette decks.

In fact, outside of receivers (mostly HT stuff), they seem to have very little in the way of other component parts--a few massive (300+) disc changers, maybe one smaller changer, the rather poor Insignia HD Radio tuner, iPod docks and USB turntables.

This Sony really came as a surprise. It acts the part of a decent quality unit, with multiple type tape support (automatically determined, no less!), a bias adjuster and Dolby HX/B/C noise reduction.

The playback report!

Interestingly, this unit is not made in China. It and most of the parts inside were made in Malaysia.

I let it sit and record for about two hours (50 minutes per side) to a TDK CrO2 (Type II) cassette, which it seemed to do without incident.

It doesn't make great recordings--or at least it didn't when it came to playing this particular tape back. The high end was muffled. Maybe I should have actually tried to set the bias knob to something other than the detent in the middle? Dunno. I figured it would be a fair compromise.

I did demagnetize the heads, but I have yet to clean them...maybe tomorrow when I have more energy, I can be bothered to find the isopropyl alcohol. They don't appear to be terribly dirty. I'd say this hasn't had a lot of use.

Playback of prerecorded tapes of varying types went better. Fresh normal-bias and Type II tapes recorded on other equipment sound OK, although it seems like the Dolby noise reduction circuit is squashing too much of the high end. So too did mass-produced prerecorded cassettes.

I had a similar deck once it was the Sony TC-FX150 it looked about the same inside and outside although mine only had a Rec Level and Noise Reduction switch (Dolby)

http://www.vintagecassette.com/Sony/TC-FX150

I think that deck came out in 1993. My father bought one for my mother at our local circuit city to go with the Realistic mini receiver we had in the living room. That was a horrible deck from day one and was shocked when my father brought that home (he said she would never know the difference). The appalling thing was in 1990 I had bought a JVC dubbing deck (I was 14) for the same money and it had a properly filled box and full logic controls.

If I remember correctly, ours did not last more that two years before it started mis-tracking and eating cassettes. I think I took it apart and figured it was not worth even worrying about. I was starting to collect audio by that time and replaced that system with a Pioneer SX-3500 receiver, Yamaha TC-511S cassette deck and a Dual turntable (although I cannot remember the model). Of course by that time she was divorced from my father and my soon to be step-father stated that "CD's were the way to go!" and instead of buying a CD player to hook to an already good system, he replaced it all with some crappy Aiwa all in one Vegas light show monstrosity that lasted about three years.

Teac made a dual well deck in the 1990's that looked alot like that. Used a Sanken motor, or maybe Sankyo, that went bad and caused a resistor in series with the motor supply to burn up. All cassette decks with plastic front panel and piano key operation are BPC.

TAGO MAGO said:

The appalling thing was in 1990 I had bought a JVC dubbing deck (I was 14) for the same money and it had a properly filled box and full logic controls.

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That is what really gripes me about it. There can be no doubt that any company can make a bad product. Still, I'd have expected much better from Sony, if for no other reason than "the Sony choice" is usually a safe one from the average consumer's viewpoint.

I'm pretty sure the azimuth adjustments are off, but it's been so long since I adjusted one that I've forgotten a lot of the details. And I probably shouldn't even bother.

TAGO MAGO said:

Of course by that time she was divorced from my father and my soon to be step-father stated that "CD's were the way to go!" and instead of buying a CD player to hook to an already good system, he replaced it all with some crappy Aiwa all in one Vegas light show monstrosity that lasted about three years.

Click to expand...

Hmmm...I hope you didn't lose your setup to that "thing"!

My brother actually has an Aiwa "stereo" much like that, although the light show (an LED show, actually) is contained to the three CD changer mechanism. The price was right, in that it was picked up off the curb along with the speakers. I managed to get one of the cassette decks (the recording one) and the CD changer back into a working state after about a half-hour's worth of tinkering.

The fixes lasted a few years until the tape transport fell apart and someone forced the tray out of the disc changer. It's still going, with an older Sony five-disc changer providing CD playback through the AUX input and a microphone that my brothers use to harass everyone in the house by turning the volume and reverb way up high.

When it finally dies, I will probably pull the STK package amplifier module if it's still good.

That deck might be the all-time winner of the "box of air" contest.

Yeah, Jeez, does it even have a power supply???

...even my TC-KE500S from about the same era has a computer-looking mother board (not good for DIY repairs but at least present) and a proper transformer!

The test of a good audio component - amp, cassettte deck, CDP, etc - is in its weight. If you stagger a bit when you pick it up, it's probably worth having.

fortycoats said:

Yeah, Jeez, does it even have a power supply???

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Actually, it does. Attached to the transformer is a small rectifier setup feeding into two DC-DC converters. The transistors are hanging upside down where you can't see them, but they have some substance to them and decent heatsinks.

uxwbill said:

Hmmm...I hope you didn't lose your setup to that "thing"!

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No, but when I went to college as this was an extra system (and I needed the money) I sold it to a friend who still has it. I think it had a pair of Boston A25 speakers with it. Those were old components in 1995, they are even older now and still work, the Aiwa, which also had the three disc changer, is long gone. I the Aiwa speakers were useful as I gave them away with a small Sansui receiver a few years back.

I did however make the same mistake twice. When the Aiwa gave up the ghost my wife and I gave my mother a JVC integrated amp, JVC tuner a pair of small Bose speakers and a new DVD player for X-mas three years ago. When she met what would be her fifth husband (the one after the Aiwa guy), he tried to hook it up at his place and he could not get it to work. Because they managed to screw my sister out of a lot of money, I've not been in contact for roughly two years. As far as I know those components ended up curbside. A shame really, I hope someone saved them. Me, I try to keep out of the Jerry Springer events of my family.

So if anyone in Manheim, PA picked up some JVC components with a pair of unremarkable Bose bookshelf speakers curbside, thank you for saving them.

The end result...

Despite the quality of the beast, there is a better outcome than I'd have expected. Before anyone gets too excited, I'd never consider this to be a true hi-fi component.

First thing I did was to clean and demagnetize the heads, which improved the state of things immensely and easily pushed the audio quality back into the "more than good enough" point.

From what I can tell, after having diddled the control thoroughly while a recording was in progress, the bias adjustment doesn't do much. It might be fair to say that it doesn't seem to do anything, but I can't say that with 100% certainty. A brand new normal bias TDK Superior D90 cassette was used for these tests. Maybe it'd make more difference on Chrome or Metal tapes?

It's very striking how aggressive the Dolby B/C encoder and decoder are in this thing. I'm not sure why this is--if something is out of adjustment or if Sony was just trying to cover up some of the shortcomings in this unit.

This unit is probably going to end up in my "garage" system along with some other scratch-n-dent pieces. It should be good enough for that application.

uxwbill said:

Despite the quality of the beast, there is a better outcome than I'd have expected. Before anyone gets too excited, I'd never consider this to be a true hi-fi component.

First thing I did was to clean and demagnetize the heads, which improved the state of things immensely and easily pushed the audio quality back into the "more than good enough" point.

From what I can tell, after having diddled the control thoroughly while a recording was in progress, the bias adjustment doesn't do much. It might be fair to say that it doesn't seem to do anything, but I can't say that with 100% certainty. A brand new normal bias TDK Superior D90 cassette was used for these tests. Maybe it'd make more difference on Chrome or Metal tapes?

It's very striking how aggressive the Dolby B/C encoder and decoder are in this thing. I'm not sure why this is--if something is out of adjustment or if Sony was just trying to cover up some of the shortcomings in this unit.

This unit is probably going to end up in my "garage" system along with some other scratch-n-dent pieces. It should be good enough for that application.

Click to expand...

All above comments seem to indicate poor frequency response.