Tascam Drive belts - 112 cassette

rob aylestone

Moderator
Just pulled my ancient 112 out and tried to use it but the loner flat type drive belt from the top motor has stretched badly and this one is used to drive the mechanism that pulls up the pinch roller. FF, RW work fine but this slack belt needs replacing. Any good sources prefereably in the UK?

The other thing is that getting this belt out and a new one in looks like a big job. Is there some trick to getting into the mechanism apart from through the top? It looks a major job to remove the mech and get access?
 
In answer to your second question - the mechanism comes out fairly easily as it is only held in with 4 screws (or possibly 6 as 2 appeared to be missing in my machine). Then there are another 2 screws holding the flywheel bearing bracket in place. Once you've removed these you can replace the capstan belt. You need to undo the other part of the bracket to change the head carriage belt. It is also best to replace the FF and Rewind idlers from the same side of the mechanism - I tried replacing just the top idler as it appeared easiest to get to but it turns out that biting the bullet and disassembling the mechanism properly actually makes the job far easier.

There are Youtube videos that show the whole process - the service manual has exploded diagrams but the best way to disassemble something isn't always obvious from them in my experience.

YouTube

Helped me a bit.
 
Again the blind leading the blind- This guy does not take the flywheel out of the bearing and oil it like it needs to be done. He ignores this entirely.
He does unnecessary things like removing the door damper which I never take off. While he has the mechanism out he does nothing to take the reel motor out oil and replace the Tires that are needed. When you skip over stuff you are headed to do the whole job over again. He gets ripped off by someone selling $7.00 of belts for over $20. Again a lack of knowledge of where these parts should come from. It is not a secret I tell people all the time.
I do not tell my trainees to watch You Tube videos except for laughs. I have been servicing these decks for 46 years and at Teac as well.
 
I just restored a 112 Mk II the other day. Took a FM8 Capstan belt and a V900X Idler tire which is very small size. It is a S107 square seal.
The 112 original parts are likely to be different as they are a different design. The 112 does not have a gear C like the Mk II does.
Belt wise Consolidated Electronics is your friend. Unlike Marrs or other places you can not order belt by model number- most of those places are wrong anyway. They do a lot of guessing. They only want you money and do not care if it is the wrong belt once you pay. That is the way of E bay and many other places as well.
The 112 may have a like reel drive system like the 122 Mk II so the same Idler tire. That system is also in many other decks as well.
 
The kit off eBay from Portugal arrived and it took ten minutes to dismantle fit and put back. It wasn't tricky, but the video on youtubeshowed which screws had to come out and which didn't, and this was the key - just showing how it came apart. It functions perfectly now and it really was simple to do.
 
Most people that are qualified Technician do not need You Tube videos to tell you how to take apart such a simple device and when they do show you what you think is the right way to service these they are most the time wrong and leave out vital required practices. How is it that people determine that You Tube persons are the experts in this field when they make so many horrible mistakes- I know, no one knows any better. Well I have told you. OK, You get a belt kit from E bay and you put it in. How many times do I get questions put to me that I put the E bay belt kit in and now my unit still does not work. Well there is a reason for that. I have NO answers for those that use E bay belt kits as they are on their own and usually the parts on E bay are WRONG. I never buy belts on E bay as they are the lowest grade chinese parts and then you expect them to work better than this.
 
I did a Tascam 112 Mk II the other day and the capstan belt was the FM8.0 but like I said before the oiling of the capstan bearing is a very important thing. This deck with the EG530KD-2B motor was giving me a wow and flutter with the AMSoil at .035% which is pretty good for a 50 cent type motor. The Gear C was in half so I had to do the whole mechanism cleaning and greasing. The old grease came out in hunks but it also affected the metal in some way as it leaves a mark.
 
I didn't respond to the first response back in Feb - but back in 1976 when I was at college I was fixing far more complex things. Youtube videos are often terrible, but in this case, it was a very quick way of finding out which parts I did not need to remove - and had I dismantled it more, it would have been pointless. I do have a qualification - but in the UK there's no such thing as a qualified technician' as some kind of status thing - you can be a technician with no qualifications and you could have qualifications in one subject and be terrible at fixing things.

I'm sorry I missed your Feb response as it's totally wrong. Tascam cannot supply genuine spares for this unit and the one I fixed is in the rack and I've used it a fair bit converting old cassettes. I put in a Chinese belt competently and where exactly would you tell people to get genuine spares? I tried and found Portugal was the closest to me. The quality was fine despite having been half way around the world. I appreciate you service as your career, so understand your protectiveness but I shall recommend the Portugal ebay seller if anyone ever asks me. Much of the music I've been copying was old piano - where wow and flutter, if present would be very obvious. It was not. best wishes.
 
Well if you are happy then there is no arguing with that. I have no experience with E bay suppliers except that when clients bring me a unit in and it has the wrong belt in it I ask where did this come from and the answer is E bay or some belt kit that was not only wrong but terribly over priced. Consolidated and PRB in the states are the accepted places to get belts- Marrs has burned down but they were not operating like a business anyway but now they don't have to.
 
Well if you are happy then there is no arguing with that. I have no experience with E bay suppliers except that when clients bring me a unit in and it has the wrong belt in it I ask where did this come from and the answer is E bay or some belt kit that was not only wrong but terribly over priced. Consolidated and PRB in the states are the accepted places to get belts- Marrs has burned down but they were not operating like a business anyway but now they don't have to.
I just did a search for PRB and was taken to their eBay page. But I appreciate the recommendation just the same.
 
Back
Top