Kenwood KX-54

[TheDocmeister]

This cassette thing is now helping with bypass surgery rehab!
I’m looking at building a cheap but reasonable recording setup from stuff that’s lying around. Next move - dig out the entry level Kenwood I bought as a young teen in 1985.
It’s going to need belts at least, but do these caps need done too? Pics online show similar markings around them on other decks, so as a newby I’m a bit unsure…

 

[floyd]

First thing I would do is test out the recording quality of the unit if you have sound quality issues or something like that then yes I would check those capacitors.
You can test the sound just by plugging some headphones in.

 

[Ghettoman]

i had the exact same cassette deck in the mid 80s, but mine was branded Trio, before it was taken over by Kenwood. i had the full Trio HiFi with a set of Big AR Speakers.

 

[TheDocmeister]

i had the exact same cassette deck in the mid 80s, but mine was branded Trio, before it was taken over by Kenwood. i had the full Trio HiFi with a set of Big AR Speakers.

Mine is still branded as Trio on the rear panel! At the time, certainly in the UK, Kenwood was a brand more familiar for food mixers…

 

[TheDocmeister]

First thing I would do is test out the recording quality of the unit if you have sound quality issues or something like that then yes I would check those capacitors.
You can test the sound just by plugging some headphones in.

Well, it’s going to need belts before I can make any judgements! Here we go…

 

[TheDocmeister]

I decided to just go for it this afternoon and ordered a big bag of belts. I’ve got the deck out and have now cleaned up wherever they’d stuck and have the pinch roller out and cleaned too. Can you tell which cotton buds cleaned the pulleys and which the heads and rollers? I obviously took clean heads seriously as a young man!

 

[Spax]

If you're talking about the schmoo around the capacitors, it looks to me like old assembly glue so probably not leaky caps BUT some of those old glues can become conductive as they age so if you're going to recap then clean up the glue too.