Best Of

I can absolutely guarantee Carl's Teac X-1000r deck is the only thing I put my hands on.

Correct relay kits arrived today. Kurt supplies some solder and solder wick with each relay kit. Instructions are emailed and very thorough. No pictures, so I had to use my brain and may have sprained it.



Instructions suggest fitting header pins from bottom of board. It's real busy inside chassis with wires and components, and this makes it easier.



One thing that made fitting easier was carefully sliding plastic base up header pins an 1/8" or so. Carefully means holding PCB sides while pushing base up without bending any components or putting pressure on tops of relays. The pins become more flexible with extra length. Less chance of harming traces using tool to bend pins against board or forcing them in. This doesn't mean you can mount the relays closer to PCB as they still have to clear components on the topside of PCB. I don't like to bend older components on PCB's as it increases risk of collateral damage.



Tight spacing on the pins so you have to check for solder bridges. I had a couple.



All fixed. You must check that pin length is not too long; that they are no longer than existing pins. An insulator sheet and metal cover are fastened under this PCB. If leads are too long, you invite a short.



You attach the white and brown wire from solenoid to first relay board. The other two boards arrive daisy chained with wires.





The boards have LED's which can be used to indicate problems. No LED's are illuminated in forward play. Reverse play, you should get three greens and one red. All good.



It lives and breathes. On to calibration.



EDIT:

One other thing Kurt Jacobs provides is a plug and play X-1000r 7"/10.5" reel size and 3.75/7.5ips speed switch. These are notorious for breaking, or failure to latch. Some guys take the springs off and manually push them in, pull them out. I read no exact replacement switches were available, only one that required modding.

The old.



The new.