Gentlemen, I don't see a 'cassette' forum, so I need to ask here.
I have a chance to locally buy what looks like a near mint condition Nakamichi Dragon for a 'reasonable' price. Problem is, it doesn't work. Seems like a nice enough seller, and I believe he's a second owner. He bought it in nonworking shape, wanting to repair it, and went as far as ordering a belt kit for it, but never got into it. He claimed that it played but didn't FF or REW, then stopped altogether.
A local shop told him it was a bad CPU board, but he said he called a good Nak repair depot in the US (I looked them up, that's all they do) and they quoted him $1000 for a full overhaul, which he didn't want to do. The US repair shop told him that the Dragon CPU boards never die, and he figured mechanism issues. that's what I believe as well, that this is strictly a mechanical issue. I'm taking a cassette down tonight to check the deck out. The going rate of what he's selling the deck for is about what a nonworking one goes for on eBay right now.
I'm not asking for a diagnosis here, all I want to know is if anyone here has worked on one before, and how hard is it to change the belts and idlers? I've worked on lots of cassette decks before, and I know they range from easy to insanely hard. Most decks are pretty easy, but I had one Aiwa top of the line deck here that I actually gave up on, it was so hard to get into the mechanism.
So, any comments?
thanks!
Curt
I have a chance to locally buy what looks like a near mint condition Nakamichi Dragon for a 'reasonable' price. Problem is, it doesn't work. Seems like a nice enough seller, and I believe he's a second owner. He bought it in nonworking shape, wanting to repair it, and went as far as ordering a belt kit for it, but never got into it. He claimed that it played but didn't FF or REW, then stopped altogether.
A local shop told him it was a bad CPU board, but he said he called a good Nak repair depot in the US (I looked them up, that's all they do) and they quoted him $1000 for a full overhaul, which he didn't want to do. The US repair shop told him that the Dragon CPU boards never die, and he figured mechanism issues. that's what I believe as well, that this is strictly a mechanical issue. I'm taking a cassette down tonight to check the deck out. The going rate of what he's selling the deck for is about what a nonworking one goes for on eBay right now.
I'm not asking for a diagnosis here, all I want to know is if anyone here has worked on one before, and how hard is it to change the belts and idlers? I've worked on lots of cassette decks before, and I know they range from easy to insanely hard. Most decks are pretty easy, but I had one Aiwa top of the line deck here that I actually gave up on, it was so hard to get into the mechanism.
So, any comments?
thanks!
Curt