Aiwa XDS 1100 DAT
 

I've been having a bit of a fixing binge lately, and my eye lit upon this Aiwa DAT machine, bought ages ago at Richer Sounds. It was sluggish to load and refused to play. I thought it was a sticky loading arm, the problem which afflicts the Sony DTC-1000s which will succeed it on the bench, but no such luck - all pivots were free, which is quite a result given the minimal use the machine has had.

So, pull out the transport chassis for a closer look. The transport electronics sit on a double-sided board on the underside of the transport. Something fell out as I turned it over - a 100u surface-mount electrolytic! Extracted the board and found about fifteen surface mount and pseudo-surface mount electrolytics in various states of deshabille and gunk spreading over the board. A clean-up and re-cap with conventional radials was all that was needed to restore correct operation.

Re: Aiwa XDS 1100 DAT
 

Good to hear a DAT success story Ted. I've got a Tascam DA20 and a Sony DTC55ES that both need fixing one of these days.