Toshiba Model M-632 VCR giving fits
 

Hello everyone yesterday at work (Goodwill for those of you who are not aware that I work there now) I found a 1992 vintage Toshiba Model M-632 4-Head Hi-Fi VCR and I went home and put it in the basement and then today I got around to testing it out to see if it worked or not (I was planning on using it as a spare VCR for my LCD Projector Setup in my Basement in case my Hitachi 4-Head Hi-Fi VCR from the late 1980s bites the dust) and anyways it didn't work right this VCR and I suspected that it was bad belts and took and opened it up and sure enough all of the belts were stretched and getting ready to turn to goo, so I replaced the main drive belt with another drive belt I had laying around that happened to fit it, but the only problem is that the other two belts (the secondary drive belt and the loading mechanism drive belt that sits in the back of the VCR were sizes that I didn't have except in the smaller audio cassette tape player mechanism sized belts so I put those in but apparently they're too small thickness wise to develop enough torque to get the loading mechanism to run because when I try to load a tape into the VCR the motor just keeps spinning but it doesn't turn the pulley that drives the loading mechanism, I had found a drive belt that was a little bit thicker than the other belt I had been using (but not the same thickness as the original belt) and I installed that and it seems to be able to turn the pulley without any problem but now it seems that for some reason when I insert a tape into the VCR the tape will load into the VCR but the loading mechanism that should load the tape into the heads and play the tape isn't responding now, and its rather odd because the VCR when its powered on initially the POST test that the VCR goes through to make sure the VCR is in proper running order passes and the VCR stays on although the VCR then powers itself off after about 45 seconds after the POST process and then I turn it back on again and it stays on but then that's when the VCR is unresponsive to a tape being inserted and the play button being pressed.

Anyways any ideas as to what's going on with this machine, or anyone have any experience with this particular model? By the way its a Samsung made machine that Toshiba put their name on (as well as some of their own parts and chips in.)
Sorry for the long winded story about this machine but it was the only way I could explain what was going on with this machine.

I have the Toshiba M649,M769 both from the mid 1990's which I bought brand new .I had to replace the idler gear assembly on each VCR around the same time years ago since the plastic pieces worn out so quick.Both VCRs still work today but they are on backup standby now.I have a third one M648 somewhere here from the same era which is broken and I cant remember what is wrong with it.

Do you think the belts might be the same as in mine? because I think mine just needs the belts replaced and it should work again, but since it doesn't have good belts in it right now its misbehaving, in fact this VCR is the one that chewed through an original VHS copy of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which would be considered the Holy Grail of classic VHS Movies that were unmolested (not digitized).

What a shame .Sorry to hear that about your Holy Grail tape. . Can you take photos of the insides of the M-632 .I want to see if it matches my VCRs here.I have not buy VCR belts in a long time.Does MCM still catty them.I hope its only a belt and not the idler gear assembly that I had to replaced years ago.

I can get a shot of the insides of this VCR.

I've repaired many lightly damaged video tapes. They're easy to take apart and re-splice. You don't lose much of the content.

I worked on four of that model in the late 90's but they all had power supply problems. Sorry...

Yes It looks the same as my two here.Check the idler assembly and see if its ok and not chewed up.I had two go on me in each VCR.Also replace the belt in it too.
Yes I dont really like it but Ive done that too.

I've looked at the idler gear assembly and it looks to be intact yet, I think it might be mainly a belt issue, but not sure until I can find out what the size of the belts are that this VCR needs because I looked over at SMC Electronics supply and their supply of belts go by the belt diameter and not necessarily by make and model of VCR.

Thats great the idler is OK.I would try a belt from another VCR if you have any non working VCRs there that you can salvage one off it.As long its a hair tighter then the bad belt .You dont want one too tight.It will put a load on the capstan motor and could burn it out.It should work until you find a new replacement.Atlease you will find out if the mechanism works ok with out chewing up your tapes.BTW ..Use a tape that you dont care if the VCR eats it.upI use 2 pencils and gently move the pencils out and see which one is smaller and use it.Just remember which belt is the original.If the original is smaller.Just keep looking until you find one a hair smaller then the original .Thats the quick way in finding one that works.Also you can measure the belt by stretching it out on the ruler like on the SMC site shows.

http://www.smcelectronics.com/vcrrep.htm

yeah I still have two of the 3 original belts yet, I actually had several old VCR Belts laying around in my parts bin stash but only one of the belts was the correct size for what I needed (the biggest belt on this VCR) the other two belts were too small compared to what I had belt wise laying around, bad part is that I don't seem to have a ruler right now, so I can't measure anything right now, I have a couple of tape measures laying around but those won't work very well.

I would keep an eye open down at the Goodwill or at curbside for VCRs for belts.For $5 bucks .Its probably cheaper getting the belt that way then ordering one online after they hit you with the inflated shipping rates.I remember the old MCM electronics catalogs had a belt measuring gauge in them .You always can get a new belt if the Toshiba works great with the used test belt.

The bad part is that I had for a while an early 1980s Hitachi top loading VCR that ended up having more wrong with it than I could repair so I salvaged all but one of the belts out of the machine and the one belt I forgot to get out of the machine would of worked for the rear loading mechanism assembly (the loading mechanism for loading the tape into the heads.)

Yes.I understand that happening after getting rid of stuff.Two months down the road you need something off it.It happens all the time here.All of us are in the same boat on storage issues with little or no room to store everything.I'm out of room here and still taking in CRT TVs here like a 25 inch Panasonic and a Sanyo 19 inch set that I took in in the past week.I probably have enough 25 inch sets here to stack them up to make the Jeopardy game show set in my living room.All I need is Alex and his contestants .

Yeah, I know that feeling, I had recently acquired an old Philco Townhouse TV from a local antique shop for $15 and I was wanting to restore it back to usable condition again but it turns out it might of been a little more than I could handle because the 'dag was coming off the back of the picture tube and the vertical oscillator is running at 30 hz instead of 60 hz causing the picture to be doubled ontop of itself and that's because there are some bad capacitors or something in the Vertical stage of the TV and it seems that it might be a little tricky to try and get to those caps to replace them besides them being rated at 1kV. Anyways I had acquired from Goodwill earlier this year a 1960s vintage Sony B & W Portable TV from the salvage and also a 1980s vintage Montgomery Wards 5" Portable Color TV that still works like new and all I had to do to it was readjust the picture adjustments in the back because the picture was kind of dark.

You could have that philco running with under $30 in parts, and a little effort.

Yes but the only problem is that the UHF Tuner is busted on the TV because one of the tuner's drive gears (which was plastic on metal) split in two and I couldn't glue it back together and the only way I could fix the tuner is to get that gear off of an old Philco Predicta from the same time period that also had UHF (because the Philco Predictas used the same type of UHF Tuner assemblies as the Philco Townhouses did). but as we all know Philco Predictas are few and far between when it comes to finding them and when you do find them (even parts units) they can run into the hundreds of dollars which I can't afford.

Just feed it a VHF channel and ignore the UHF....If the sun roof on your car refuses to open, but all else is good would you let that stop you from commuting to work in that car or keeping up with oil changes? Hell with no UHF on the air and no analog cable I have not even bothered trying to check if the UHF could work on some of my sets because it's existence is superfluous.

I guess, but I would of figured that maybe with that UHF Tuning knob being functional would of been part of the value of that TV set but I see your point too seeing as we no longer have analog TV signals to feed it it really makes no sense to use it anymore.

OK so an update on the VCR that this thread was initially about, I was able to locate some belts for this thing but now the VCR isn't wanting to start up properly, I go and turn on the power button and the VCR will act like its trying to go through its "POST" test but all it ends up doing is just powering on the video head and spinning that up for about 30 seconds and that's it then it shuts off because for some reason or another the the loading mechanism doesnt do its power on test like its supposed to it just sits there and does nothing while the video head drum does its self test and that's it. Anyways I have the issue traced down to the mode switch not being set right in reference to the tape loading mechanism's loading cam gear (the loading mechanism that brings the tape up to the heads when you push play) and I can't seem to figure out which position on the mode switch/loading mechanism cam is supposed to be stop (which I think is what the mode switch is supposed to be set at when the VCR is powered on with no tape in it) anyways the mode switch not being set right is the only thing keeping this VCR from functioning properly, because the loading mechanism isn't timed right currently in reference to the mode switch and where its supposed to be and because of that its not allowing the VCR to power on properly. The reason why the mode switch is messed up is because I had to take the tape loading mechanism's motor and cam assembly out of the cabinet in order to get the old belt out and install the new belt (because before that the VCR powered on like it was supposed to just fine it just didn't load and play tapes properly because of stretched belts) but anyways since I didn't have a service manual for this particular VCR I was just kind of guessing about how the VCR's tape loading mechanism went back together by just going by memory of how it was put together previously but apparently my memory was a little faulty because now the VCR doesn't power up properly anymore and because of that I can't tell if the belts I got the VCR had fixed the loading and playback function on the VCR. Any ideas as to how I might go about resetting/retiming the mode switch with the tape loading mechanism cam gear assembly? Any help would be appreciated.

These VCRs were secretly assembled by Samsung for Toshiba during the early-90s. It bagan in 1988 for some mono models, despite they may look all Toshiba-designed inside.