Repairing Cassette Tapes
2024-Jul-18, Thursday 02:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chebeYou've repaired your cassette player. You spend time digging out your old cassettes, only to discover that the tape has snapped and is loose inside the cassette case. What do you do? Learn how to repair them of course!
The first thing that needs to be done is to open the cassette tape. Some are, helpfully, screwed shut, and easy to open up. Others appear to be press-fit and chemically (with a plastic melting glue) sealed. Which means taking an x-acto knife blade and going carefully around the seam, breaking the two sides of the case apart. (Trying to not get the tape caught, and breaking the x-acto blade, in the process.) Once they come apart one side has the wheels, foam pressure pad, and most of the plastic threading structure. You work on this side, leaving the other one aside for the time being.
When I (finally) got mine open the problem wasn't as bad as I'd expected. Turned out that the splicing tape that held the leader tape and the magnetic tape together had lost its adhesive. All that needs to be done is to re-attach them! Time to pull out the 1/8" Splicing Kit. I don't actually need to cut any tape, so I just line up the magnetic tape to the vertical line (magnetic side down), remove the bad splicing tape, and line up the leader tape with the magnetic tape. I cut a length of the new splicing tape, and lay it over the join, smooth it out and rub over it a few times to ensure a good seal.
Then I remove the tape from the block channel, wind the reels back up (with a handy Bic biro), thread the tape through the wheels and pressure pad channels. And finally replace the other side of the cassette case (making sure not to catch the tape), and using regular clear sticky tape on three sides to keep it closed.
Next thing is to test the fix. I listen to the tape, and all is going well, until the end. Playback doesn't stop, even though the music is finished. It just keeps spinning. I stop the player, look inside, and yep, the exact same thing has happened to the joining tape on this end. So I reopen the case (being super glad I hadn't glued it shut), and make the same repair to this end.
But this is only the first tape of a two tape set. And yes, the other tape has the same issue. But this time as I'm forcing the case open I accidentally get some of the magnetic tape caught and mangle it. So now I have two repairs to make; joining the leader tape to the magnetic tape, and using some of the splicing tape to reinforce the mangled section of the magnetic tape. This tape is applied to the back of the magnetic tape, and luckily in the section before the recorded music, so it isn't audible.
I close it all back up, and test the repair. It all works. But at the end of the tape it does actually auto-stop. The original splicing tape hasn't failed here. It failed on three-of-four ends, and now I'm just counting the days until the fourth one goes too. But until then, these tapes are functional again!
Lower section of a cassette tape, with no tape threaded
Photo by chebe
The first thing that needs to be done is to open the cassette tape. Some are, helpfully, screwed shut, and easy to open up. Others appear to be press-fit and chemically (with a plastic melting glue) sealed. Which means taking an x-acto knife blade and going carefully around the seam, breaking the two sides of the case apart. (Trying to not get the tape caught, and breaking the x-acto blade, in the process.) Once they come apart one side has the wheels, foam pressure pad, and most of the plastic threading structure. You work on this side, leaving the other one aside for the time being.
Cassette opened, with the leader and magnetic tapes disconnected
Photo by chebe
When I (finally) got mine open the problem wasn't as bad as I'd expected. Turned out that the splicing tape that held the leader tape and the magnetic tape together had lost its adhesive. All that needs to be done is to re-attach them! Time to pull out the 1/8" Splicing Kit. I don't actually need to cut any tape, so I just line up the magnetic tape to the vertical line (magnetic side down), remove the bad splicing tape, and line up the leader tape with the magnetic tape. I cut a length of the new splicing tape, and lay it over the join, smooth it out and rub over it a few times to ensure a good seal.
Magnetic tape lined up to the vertical marking on the splicing block
Photo by chebe
Magnetic and leader tapes spliced together, in the splicing block
Photo by chebe
Then I remove the tape from the block channel, wind the reels back up (with a handy Bic biro), thread the tape through the wheels and pressure pad channels. And finally replace the other side of the cassette case (making sure not to catch the tape), and using regular clear sticky tape on three sides to keep it closed.
Next thing is to test the fix. I listen to the tape, and all is going well, until the end. Playback doesn't stop, even though the music is finished. It just keeps spinning. I stop the player, look inside, and yep, the exact same thing has happened to the joining tape on this end. So I reopen the case (being super glad I hadn't glued it shut), and make the same repair to this end.
But this is only the first tape of a two tape set. And yes, the other tape has the same issue. But this time as I'm forcing the case open I accidentally get some of the magnetic tape caught and mangle it. So now I have two repairs to make; joining the leader tape to the magnetic tape, and using some of the splicing tape to reinforce the mangled section of the magnetic tape. This tape is applied to the back of the magnetic tape, and luckily in the section before the recorded music, so it isn't audible.
I close it all back up, and test the repair. It all works. But at the end of the tape it does actually auto-stop. The original splicing tape hasn't failed here. It failed on three-of-four ends, and now I'm just counting the days until the fourth one goes too. But until then, these tapes are functional again!
Magnetic and leader tapes lined up to the vertical marking on the splicing block
Photo by chebe
Tapes spliced together, and reinforced section, in the splicing block
Photo by chebe
Lower section of a cassette tape, with clear leader tape threaded
Photo by chebe
