JVC HR-7200U Top Loading VCR Problem.

[VintageLove]

This unit caught my eye at the Sally Anne last week. Usually when I see something this old I jump on it, finding these old VCR's where I live seem to be a rare oddity.

At first the VCR would not rewind or fast-forward, moving the motor around seemed to fix this problem. I thought it might have been a broken gear at first.

The pinch roller surprisingly is not hard or glazed it grips fairly well. I decided to move ahead and of course one of the belts was glazed and rough. It was the belt you see in the video, I just used a elastic band as a temp solution.

The main problem I am having right now is I can't get the movie to play. As soon as I press play the guide rollers come out with the tape wrapping it around the head, but the tape will not move. There is no movement at all in the take up reel. For some reason the Pinch Roller will not fully rest against the metal capstand I think it's called which rotates the pinch roller. The Pinch Roller is on a metal linkage arm, it moves freely no restriction at all. If I push the linkage by hand and hold it, it pushes the pinch roller against the capstand and the tape will start to move, but then shuts down the machine.

I have supplied a video and pictures to detail the problem. -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw6iAh-nCkI

[Ed in Tx]

Sounds like it isn't completing the loading cycle and engaging the pinch roller. I recall these have a loading belt. But there is only a brief out of focus glimpse of the loading motor in the last few frames of your video so I can't tell if it has a belt or a worm gear drive.

BTW hold the camera horizontal so viewers will see a full screen picture.

[VintageLove]

Thanks for the reply Ed.

Well after much frustration it turned out to be the belt in the picture below that was causing all the grief luckily enough I had a spare belt I kept from a 82 RCA Selectavision that seemed to fix the problem. I found out the old belt was not putting enough tension to engage the pincher roller. Picture quality is pretty amazing after cleaning the head. Now that, that problem is fixed. It seems like abit of a audio problem now. When people are talking in a movie it comes through clearly but when music plays it seems it go goes up and down in waves?

[Captainclock]

Interestingly enough your VCR had the same issue as my old Hitachi VCR had (it too was a top loader but a few years older than yours) but anyways mine sadly enough didn't work perfectly like yours did once I replaced the belts as mine has several electrical problems including playing the tape too fast the tuner or the VCR part not wanting to produce a picture (it will just go blank with no audio or video) and then I accidentally shorted something related to the clock/timer display because now the clock/timer display is screwed up. So I think my Hitachi VCR is sadly a lost cause.

[Ed in Tx]

Yep that's the loading belt you replaced.

The audio problem may well be the use of a rubber band in place of a correct capstan belt. The stretching could cause excess speed variation.