Picked up a TSR-8 and have questions.

R

Rookietapeguy

New member
Picked up a visually clean Tascam TSR-8 and Tascam m-512 mixer with wires (snakes) at an estate sale this weekend. My question is about the TSR-8 It powers on and the functions seem to work. I just ordered tape so I won’t be able to fully test till it arrives. One of the wheels with the rubber tire (I don’t know what to call it) on the left side of the player ticks and sticks a little when I spin by hand. It moves with little to no resistance when I lift the lever on the same side before I spin? Does that make sense? Lol. I was curious if this is normal or if they’ll be an issue with the roller? If so how hard is it to repair.

TIA.
 
Not sure I understand what is happening. Take a video and post to YouTube, and then post a link here. I think that would help. What I’m understanding is that’s the tach roller on the supply side, but that should spin freely and silently at all times. It’s not mechanically connected to anything else in the transport. It simply sends movement data to the transport logic and it does this with an optical sensor. So that’s what I’m not clear about...never heard of anything with the tach roller on that generation of machine making noises or being effected by the position of the tension arms.

Congratulations by the way. Sounds like a neat find and the M-512 and TSR-8 make a nice pair.
 
The tach roller on the left has grooves in the rubber. As said, it should spin freely. The pinch roller on the right is solid, that should also spin freely unless it's engaged with the metal drive roller above it.
The reel tables at the top (which have a rubber mat on them) should turn more easily in one direction than the other owing to the way the brakes work. Certain operations such as EDIT or fast wind will lift the brakes.
 
Sounds like it’s the “tach roller” it has the grooves in the rubber. Is there a bearing I could replace or do I have to replace the whole part?

I’ll get a video up tonight.

Thanks for y’alls help.
 
This is the construction:

tach_roller.png

...so there are two bearings, marked '64' on the diagram - of type MR105ZZ according to the manual.
62 is a spring, so watch for that.
23 is the base-plate, which has about three black markings on it. The sensors are detecting that moving, so make sure it's not damaged.
 
Don’t get cheap “skate” bearings or be swayed by the ABEC rating. Bite the bullet and get a set of Nachi or SKF metal shield bearings. The cheap bearings and skate bearings are mechanically “noisey”.
 
Here’s a link to a quick vid I shot of it so y’all can confirm it’s a bearing issue? Or something else. Probelem is they won’t allow me to post links? I titled the video “1017 TSR8 issue homerecording” on YouTube if you want to venture over to find it.
 
It's been a while, but I think you need to do the following:
1. Unscrew and remove the plastic cover over the head.
2. Remove the left and right tension rollers. Twist the cap and they will unscrew. Watch for any little washers on the shaft.
3. The pinch roller on the right. Unscrew the top cap and the roller will slide off the shaft.
4. Unscrew the front deck plate - you should now be able to lift this away, now all the rollers obstructing it have been removed.
5. Remove the top cap on the tach roller, unscrew it as for the others. Watch out for the spring. I think it will just slide off the shaft now the top plate has been removed.

I'd just take it off and inspect things first before actually attempting to swap the bearings out, just in case there's some kind of obstruction or other obvious problem with it.
 
Thank you guys so much. I think I fixed it. I pulled the tach roller off and it appears someone re assembled it wrong. Both bearings were stacked on the front side of the spacer. I removed and then in there proper place and now it spins silently with no unnatural resistance! Woot woot! It is missing the spring (62 in the diagram) were can I get a replacement? Anyone have a part number? Hopefully that’s all the issues for now! Thanks again.
 
Good to hear. It just says 'Spring C' in the manual. On mine, it's about 5mm in diameter, and about 6mm long. No idea what the tension is or even why it's there, to be honest. It looks like the machine should run with it missing, but it might be worth looking out for a suitable replacement.

Talking of springs, beware if you ever take the lifter assembly apart - take photos first. I didn't, and only figured out how to reassemble it by studying a parts deck. If that one is incorrectly assembled the lifter arms won't retract properly and may hold the tape slightly away from the heads which is not a good thing for the recording quality.

EDIT: The TEAC part number is 5801302600, just in case they have them. Might be about 15 years too late, but you never know...
 
Hey great job, guys! :D

It’s worth a phone call to Teac on that spring. Otherwise check at your local hardware store. Mind jpmorris’ dimensions, it doesn’t need to have a great deal of tension...you should be able to find something that works. Most hardware stores have a pretty good assortment of springs, and if you are near a larger city there are often speciality hardware stores that have all kinds of crazy fasteners, springs, etc.

Good job getting it figured out.

The purpose of that spring is to “pre-load” the bearings...to take the natural play out of the bearings and load the balls against the races. This reduces mechanical noise that might otherwise occur and be physically transferred to your tape and possibly effect your recordings.

Rookietapeguy 1, silly tach roller reassembly 0.
 
Alright guys I got a tape and she seems to work ok with a couple of quarks that may be user error or need attention. Maybe y’all can help me again.
1. When I press play the main tape reel on the left (the one with the tape on it) gets slack enough to droop the tape down a couple of inches. If I put my hand on it to let it catch up it bounces a bit then works no problem.

2. Counter isn’t changing. Only shows zero. When I fixed the tach roller bearings there was a “disc” with black markings on it. They were smudge/worn. Would this have any effect on it?

3. When I rewind it starts slow goes crazy fast for a bit then slows to a crawl. This seems to change if I manually hold the lever on the right up.

4. Trying to stop it from rewinding? If i press stop or play it stop then it goes into ultra fast fast forward? I have to power it down to stop it. Am I doing something wrong here?

It’s been fun messing with it and I hope to get it in working order. Worst case I chalk it up to a learning experience and sell it for parts.

Let me know what y’all think.
 
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Yeah, if the tach roller isn't working properly, the transport will go berserk. Racing off at maximum speed and not responding to the keypad is a known symptom - probably the processor is getting confused by the lack of response.

Can you show a photo of the smudged tach roller disc? It should look like this: NEW TASCAM REEL TSR-8 COUNTER ROLLER BEARINGS ENCODER STROBE DISC | #316238335

At the end of the day it's an optical sensor so you could probably touch up the markings if need be. Try to keep them accurate though, if they're out of spec it'll probably cause the tape speed to change. I'm not sure how easy it is to get a new one these days.

Once the counter is working properly, then take stock of the remaining problems, since that should make at least some of them go away. If fixing the tach roller doesn't fix it, no.1 might be a tape tension problem. There are a group of trimmers to adjust that, but make sure you use a non-conductive adjustment tool (ceramic, or plastic) since someone else here managed to short out the deck while doing that and damaged the logic board.

Again, fix the tach roller first and worry about that later.
 
May have found the problem. It seems as though when the previous owner put the tach roller on wrong it must have his the top optical sensor. First off you can see wear on the black marks on the back of the disc. Second it seems to have broken 2 of the leads to the board. Ugh.

I’m going to try and drop some solder on the broken connections and touch up the black on the sensor to see if that fixes her up. Otherwise I’ll keep my eyes out for a new board.

Any other recommendations?
 
Offhand, no - if it were me I'd try attaching an oscilloscope to the sensors to make sure that they're reacting to light, e.g. passing your hand or the roller over them, but I appreciate that's a piece of equipment you might not have.
 
Oh yeah, when testing without tape - don't forget that the counter will only advance when the right-hand tension arm is lifted. If you just spin the tach roller on its own, nothing will happen to the counter, it'll just ignore it. Also trying it just now it does take a couple of rotations for each second to advance.
 
Thank you for all your help. Sadly I don’t think I’m going to be able to solder the broken tabs. I tried several times and it’s just not taking the solder. Could be my tools but it’s all I have to work with. If I could find a replacement board I think I’d be all set. I may keep my eyes peeled on eBay for awhile. Worse case I’m sure I can either part it out sell it as-is and come out a little ahead.

I was really hoping to play with it.
 
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