Looking for help on 88-94 cassette deck repair

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94SL

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Struck out on YouTube. Anyone know of a post or write up on repairing cassette decks for our trucks? Maybe with a lot of photos? Search function on this site didn't turn up anything for me.
 

DerekTheGreat

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What is wrong with it exactly?

Seems of the two or three I've had apart, they just needed to be cleaned with alcohol and cotton swabs. Then if the eject mechanism sticks, keep pressing the button while helping the brackets up with your fingers. Do all of this on the bench of course and not in the truck, much easier that way. ;)

Beyond that, find another one at a yard. This applies to the equalizer tape decks, I've never bothered with the economy decks. Might have a spare from the '92 we just bought if you need it.
 

94SL

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The deck is out of the truck. When the deck was installed, and a tape is inserted, it just clicks every so many seconds. not sure if it is trying to eject, if it thinks it is at the end of the tape, or some other issue. My stock cassette is the non-eq version. Cleaning with the deck assembled did not help. I bought an EQ cassette deck, cleaned before installing, but made the same noise.

Most of the 88-94 trucks in the yards I visit are missing the cassette decks. Pulled two decks 2 weeks ago, one rattled upon getting it out of the dash, so didn't get it. One looked decent, no obvious flaws, but made the clicking sound when I got it home and cleaned up, so got a refund. Went to one yard last week, no decks available.

If you have a spare tape deck your willing to part with, send me a pm regarding it.
 

DerekTheGreat

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Which tape deck do you have? The economy one or the fawncy one with an equalizer and such?

I might have a spare economy one as I intend on upgrading my spouse's truck.

However, the deck I put in my truck did the same thing yours did. Try running it on the bench after going over it with alcohol swabs, again if you've already done it. Then power the thing on, connected to the amp and head unit of course. (remember, you'll need a transformer as you don't really want to throw more than 14ish volts at it all. I've got a nice digital one, overkill considering my weak abilities)
Anyway, I got my deck to stop that clicking nonsense by putting a tape in after cleaning and then making sure the tape was mid way through. When I hit play, I got all the clicking but then helped the posts(?) which spin the tape manually by hand. That was the ticket for my deck. Started working after that. I let it play for a while and then jogged it through fast forward and reverse a few times. Plays tapes beautifully now. So you might get away with that on your deck as well.

It could be easier to manually help it if you fool the deck into thinking a tape is loaded by pushing the loading mechanism into the same position it would be in if a tape was loaded. You'll get the same clicky-clicky only you wont have a tape in the way to hinder diagnosis.
 

DerekTheGreat

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Gotcha. Try the stuff I mentioned and perhaps by then I'll have her stuff swapped out. I'm not really in a hurry to swap her stuff since at the moment she's not driving the truck, but if you need it I'd probably get out there sooner.
 

94SL

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I have a line on a old take-off. A co-worker went to lunch with me yesterday, and we got to talking about the hole in my dash. One of his in-laws had a suburban with the same dash and they pulled out the stock radio/tape deck and replaced it with something aftermarket. So my friend is going ask about the old setup
 
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Cheap Heap

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I'm having the same issue with my non eq tape deck. I've had it apart a few times today now and as far as I can tell its an issue with the belt slipping. My belt has enough torque to spin the heads but when it does an auto reverse it takes more torque to move the mechanism and the belt slips and just keeps making the clicking noise. When the deck gets stuck in this 'clicking' state you also cannot eject the tape. If you manually spin the heads the mechanism with finally move into position and you can eject the tape normally. I ordered two new belts, one 9.5in and one 10in, both 1.2mm square (SBS). My belt is still in one piece but its very brittle, stretched, and has a kink in it. I'm hoping a new belt will resolve these issues.
 

DerekTheGreat

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I put a tape in my deck just this morning. It's back to favoring the left channel and making noise when in operation. Oh well, looks cool and I mostly have the thing for using my aux input mod, which works just fine.
 

2sticks

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Which tape deck do you have? The economy one or the fawncy one with an equalizer and such?

I might have a spare economy one as I intend on upgrading my spouse's truck.

However, the deck I put in my truck did the same thing yours did. Try running it on the bench after going over it with alcohol swabs, again if you've already done it. Then power the thing on, connected to the amp and head unit of course. (remember, you'll need a transformer as you don't really want to throw more than 14ish volts at it all. I've got a nice digital one, overkill considering my weak abilities)
Anyway, I got my deck to stop that clicking nonsense by putting a tape in after cleaning and then making sure the tape was mid way through. When I hit play, I got all the clicking but then helped the posts(?) which spin the tape manually by hand. That was the ticket for my deck. Started working after that. I let it play for a while and then jogged it through fast forward and reverse a few times. Plays tapes beautifully now. So you might get away with that on your deck as well.

It could be easier to manually help it if you fool the deck into thinking a tape is loaded by pushing the loading mechanism into the same position it would be in if a tape was loaded. You'll get the same clicky-clicky only you wont have a tape in the way to hinder diagnosis.
this exact process worked for me as well. now just trying to figure out why my equalizer only has bass and treble...the middle buttons do nothing
 
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