New Reel to reel purchase, Hopefully worth it?

  • Thread starter Thread starter samth3mancgp
  • Start date Start date
samth3mancgp

samth3mancgp

New member
So yesterday when I was up late content browsing around and tinkering with my 80-8 I came upon an eBay auction that seemed like a good deal. It was a Dokorder 7140. The winning bid was $61 plus $40 shipping (which i'm fine with because I'd rather that than drive another 100 miles or so to get a lesser deck for a higher price)

I've found some threads about this deck and other dokorder decks here, and on AudioKarma. It seems like there is mixed emotions about it. Many people said it was cheap and un-reliable. Others said it was the most feature full deck for the price, and it sounded nice and warm. One thing that everybody agreed on was that Finding spare parts for it is difficult. There is a series of those short gimmicky expert village videos about restoring a reel to reel and the person doing the videos is using the same Dokorder deck. He said that links to his e-mail were availible but I could not find them. I was going to ask If I could get the service manual from him. Perhaps somebody on this forum has a copy? :)

I am planning on bringing it into where I go to school for a music tech class with a friend. It is part of an "Advanced Music Studies" program that we are taking our senior year. Since the Sony TC-377 isnt geared toward recording options like sync, and the 80-8 is too big and the track count is not practical for a small setup at school, I think the 4 track with options like sync, sound on sound, pitch control would be best. It will be fun to experiment with different tapes, slower speeds, bias settings etc. We will get to record some of the best musicians from schools all over the county. When I had the TC-377 in there for ahwile while it was working by a stroke of dumb luck we recorded one of the piano players improvising using 2 CAD condensers and the direct outs on the back of a firepod preamp. All of the teachers (that laughed at us when we first brought it in) were awestruck by how great the old technology sounded! The only teacher that appriciated analog was an older guy who retired this past semester. He knew all about them and loved it because it was whatq he grew up with. The teacher that replaced him, as well as the others all went to college in the 90s. They thought the analog stuff was a waste of time. We proved them wrong with one recording :p
 
It showed up today. It was packaged pretty well, many layers of cardboard and foam inside a dell computer box. I dont think it was damaged in shipping. The most obvious things are that no lights turn on or work for that matter when I turn it on. There appears to be 3 motors and the right spins when I hit play. the one on the left only spins when I hit rewind, but that is no different than on my TC-377 so it seems that the motors are running properly. I think I watched a belt attached to the flywheel break in it's old age (I think this is the only belt on it that I can see) It is not in the condition that I want it to be in, but it's about what I was expecting.

Could every single light be out on it? that seems like a bit of a stretch. there is a fuse on the back. I tested it for continuity and I dont think it has been blown, which takes an easy fix out of the question :(

I'm typing this as I check this thing out..

It looks like there is a small hydraulic type coil that is supposed to release the brakes on the motors that is connected to a switch on that is pressed by the capstan mechanism (which does not engage because of another hydraulic type thing that definitely needs to be oiled up. I'll leave it at that for this post. I guess I got what I paid for.
 
Yup that's it! haha. I'm actually waiting on an e-mail from that guy in the video to see if i can get a scan of the Owners and Service manuals. I'll up them to the hi-fi engine website if I get them since they were NOWHERE to be found online.

I got the litle hydualic looking thing for the capstan oiled and I super glued the belt back together. It looks like it was before :( It will be a temporary fix hopefully.
 
samth3mancgp said:
Yup that's it! haha. I'm actually waiting on an e-mail from that guy in the video to see if i can get a scan of the Owners and Service manuals. I'll up them to the hi-fi engine website if I get them since they were NOWHERE to be found online.

I got the litle hydualic looking thing for the capstan oiled and I super glued the belt back together. It looks like it was before :( It will be a temporary fix hopefully.
Click to expand...
LOL! oh, well. re video, guess i'm a day late and a dollar short, as they say.

congrats on fixes you got done.
 
Once I get the capstan rolling I'll try and get some tape moving. I also noticed that when the capstan is engaged the mechanism pushes a series of switches. One of them is hooked up to something that seems to engage and disengage the brakes.

I also just found socket type plug that had broken and broke about 10 connections loose. when i press it down to the board i get 3 VU metters to light up that green color! it's nice to see the lights come on! :)
 
My father in-law and I were talking about the Dokorder decks and he was impressed with them back in the day. Correct me if I'm wrong but some of them had test tones for calibration. Cool stuff.
 
Mine does not have the test tones built in, however it does have a tape echo effect. It's actually 2 selectable ones. one is a sound on sound echo, and the other is just called "echo". The "Echo" has a control for the delay rate I think. If the unit was working I would relaly be playing around with that! It's got a few other good features considering the price I paid like sync, and has 3 motors so there is only one belt.

After getting the belt back on the way it was (I dont think it is on correctly because when I use the switch to change the speed the belt gets all caught up in it. I am still unable to get the capstan to engage. unlike my TC-377, which has a purely mechanical capstan engage, This has two small hydraulic type electric coiled looking things (haha I have no idea what they actually are or what they are called) That must not have sufficient (if any) power to them to work ad engage the capstan. When I hold it there manually It seems to have no problems pushing the tape. I just need to get those working

I tried super gluing the socket connector of wires back together and it works a bit better. when I plug it in and get it positioned right it will light up 3 VU meters but that is all it seems to do. :confused: Perhaps the wires on this socket are transferring audio? I say this because I am not getting anything in or out of the recorder right now. I'm wondering If this could be any worse. I'm so mad that I didn't search for other 7140s and see the one that ended up selling for LESS than this one that worked fine :( The picture had all of the lights lit, and the seller had several commercially recorded Quadraphonic tapes with it.
 
Oops. I just realized that whole time I was talking about the capstan but I meant the pinch roller. the capstan is moving now that the belt is on but the pinch roller will not engage when I press play. I think the "hydraulic things" that I described is a Rotary Solenoid. Hope this makes it a little bit clearer to anybody trying to give advice.
 
i really hope you're able to get this one going.
 
Last edited:
The tape echo should be cool as long as you can get the other bugs worked out. If the roller itself is sticky ETC you can have it rebuilt by http://www.terrysrubberrollers.com/ Some of the guys on the forum have done business with him and recommend him.
 
When I manually engage the pinch roller I pushes the tape just fine and It doesn't look like it has dried up or gotten sticky. The rotary solenoids might not have appropriate power getting to them.

I'm waiting for an e-mail back from that guy on the expert village videos westgate posted earlier. I hope he didn't expect me to offer a lot of money for them. Paying for the actual paper manual, maybe.. but an electronic copy should not be payed for. You can get the manuals for any manual for free on the manufacturer website for things bought these days. The manuals for this old equipment should be free as well. Now quite a few of the companies are either no longer in business or do not have a website with a list of products (like Dokorder). It's a good thing that there are places like hi-fi engine for trying to get a comprehensive "library" of manuals and schematics of all of these vintage electronics. If i have to pay for a manual for the Dokorder, I will definitely be uploading it to hi-fi engine.
 
The switches for sync/playback were very corroded. The switches moved but I could see the part that was supposed move to change the circuit was barely moving. I put contact cleaner in each one and worked them until they all seemed to move back and forth all the way. It still dosent seem to pass any audio through it whether input monitor, sync, or playback. Do you think that a problem as severe as that could just be some terribly dirty switches? Or is it most likely caps that need replacing?

The rotary solenoids are all wired to a small board that is suspended in the back of the unit away from the others. I tried to follow the gray cables coming out of the pause switch and I think that they are attached to this board too, which makes sense because that is how it is on the TC-377 as well (but the 377 is all mechanical). So right now the pause switch does nothing because it is connected to that same board. When I manually move the two solenoids attached to the pinch roller they will engage the roller.

All record lamps are lit, and all but one VU lamp is lit now that I have super glued that Socket connector back together. I'll get some pictures of everything I am talking about soon.

I know this machine isn't really worth much, but I paid $60 for it. It may seem like pocket change to some people but i'm still in high school. I already have 3 machines, and only one of them is functioning enough that I can actually record and playback on all channels. If I were to get another one It would just be more money spent on a machine that will probably need some kind of work done to it. I can't tell right now if I will be needing any other new parts besides a new belt (which I can still get). But if I can get a schematic and post it here, hopefully I can be guided through this a little bit more. And I'd definitely rather have a working 4 track machine than a working 2 track (the Sony). :)
 
Any ideas as to why there is not any power to the rotary solenoids? I should probably just get this hunk of junk serviced.. If thats even possible anymore? It would probably cost a crap ton, which I cannot pay for. :(

How much does it usually cost to get a deck serviced?
 
I finally got an e-mail back from the guy in those videos. I'd rather buy a manual on eBay that pay him for one. he wants $20 for just the owners manual. And something about trading an Electrovoice RE20 for the other one?

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/RE20/
Haha that sure isn't happening? I don't have that mic or anything that costs as much as it.

I feel like I am getting no where with any of my analog stuff. Even the 80-8 that I have new tape for is still having weird problems getting the Bias set for the tape. I am slowly learning more about the basic electronics that make up many parts of these circuits, but I'm still pretty lost. :(
 
Last edited:
samth3mancgp said:
I finally got an e-mail back from the guy in those videos. I'd rather buy a manual on eBay that pay him for one. he wants $20 for just the owners manual. And something about trading an Electrovoice RE20 for the other one?

="http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/RE20/"

Haha that sure isn't happening? I don't have that mic or anything that costs as much as it.

I feel like I am getting no where with any of my analog stuff. Even the 80-8 that I have new tape for is still having weird problems getting the Bias set for the tape. I am slowly learning more about the basic electronics that make up many parts of these circuits, but I'm still pretty lost. :(
Click to expand...
you're way ahead of me on that stuff.:o
 
Alright, here's an idea. I still have the box and the very good packaging that this Dokorder unit was shipped in. I might re-list this on eBay along with several other items like some PCI-e video cards. I hope to get about $50-60 for the Dokorder (which is what I paid for it). And maybe $20 a piece for the video cards. I think it would help me ALOT to have a deck that many people here have experience with if I am going to get help with it. If I can get a good $120 I might be able to find a nice stereo deck or a 4 track on craigslist. Here area few that I am curently browsing:

http://winchester.craigslist.org/msg/1459085973.html

http://baltimore.craigslist.org/msg/1499963876.html

http://baltimore.craigslist.org/ele/1499528739.html

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/doc/msg/1498678276.html

The Tascam 32, and the Otari MX5050 look promising. The others were just different listings I saw that might also be worth it more than this Dokorder.
 
Skip the Akai, check out the 32 and if that fails, look at the Otari. Get the one in best condition. My first option is the 32.
 
yea the tascam looked like a really good deal. It's 2 track, 2 channel right? So when the tape is flipped it will play backwards? (and actually be audible haha). And the fact that It can do 15ips is definitely a plus. I would really like to have a 4 track with sync features to bring into the school, but In my situation it might difficult to find one. Theres several like the TEAC A-3340/3440 and Tascam, and Otari 4 tracks that would be really nice! but I won't have the cash for those. Getting started with analog is pretty expensive, but I guess it was the same way with digital. A 2 channel interface costs about the same as a locally bought deck i guess.

Now about the Dokorder.. Obviously I'm going to have to put it back together and take some good pictures. I think that cleaning up the outside a bit and taking good pictures can probably make the difference even for an "As is" unit. Would it be good to describe all the things that are wrong with it (Pinch roller does not engage, Solenoids do not have power, Audio circuits do not have power. Belt will need to be replaced) or would it be better to keep it simpler and just say that it powers on and the lights come on but I'm selling "As is" like plenty of other auctions? Either one could have it's positives and negatives depending on who the potential buyer is. If it was somebody who knew how to fix these machines, It would be very helpful to know some general problems, but there are also the buyers that might just be getting into analog and they want to buy a unit cheap to be professionally repaired, or want to learn how to fix it themselves that might be discouraged by so many problems listed. Just a couple of thoughts that I had.
 
samth3mancgp said:
Now about the Dokorder.. Obviously I'm going to have to put it back together and take some good pictures. I think that cleaning up the outside a bit and taking good pictures can probably make the difference even for an "As is" unit.

Would it be good to describe all the things that are wrong with it (Pinch roller does not engage, Solenoids do not have power, Audio circuits do not have power. Belt will need to be replaced) or would it be better to keep it simpler and just say that it powers on and the lights come on but I'm selling "As is" like plenty of other auctions?

Either one could have it's positives and negatives depending on who the potential buyer is. If it was somebody who knew how to fix these machines, It would be very helpful to know some general problems, but there are also the buyers that might just be getting into analog and they want to buy a unit cheap to be professionally repaired, or want to learn how to fix it themselves that might be discouraged by so many problems listed. Just a couple of thoughts that I had.
Click to expand...
:eek::confused::rolleyes:
full disclosure and honesty is the best policy here, imo.
anything else will come back to bite you in the a$$ down the road. karma and all that...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top