I own several Panasonic RX-2700 personal cassette players. I did a quick sacrificial tear-down of the most damaged one and it just doesn’t seem that hard to replace the belts. While I am replacing the belts, what else should I do as part of a full restore? I’ve never done anything past belt replacements on my cassette players. I see a lot of people re-capping. Is it absolutely necessary and why? Best sources to purchase capacitors? Any other parts that I should consider replacing while I’m in there? What parts should be re-lubricated and best lubrication products? Any other tips and tricks before I get started? I want to do this correctly. The RX-2700 is a tedious machine to service so I only want to get in there once. I have FOUR RX-2700’s and looking forward to getting them all working.
I'm sure much more experienced people will chime in but having done circa 300 decks here are my tips in rough order upon taking the mech out: 1. Clean with isopropyl the tape transport, all moving parts where metal slides and where there is dried grease 2. Change belts with the closet match possible 3. I usually add a drop (a single, less is more) to the motor shaft or in the lubrication hole if there is one and a drop in the speed adjustment point 3. Check capstan rollers/pinch roller and clean or replace as needed, monitor tape transport to see its passing smoothly, can use Rubber Renew if they need it and you cant replace 4. Hold a iso soaked cotton bud on the capstan while its rotating to clean 4. Clean play and record head with Iso then clean off thoroughly 5. Apply new grease as close to factory spec as you can (I forget the brand I use but will dig it out if you need it) 6. Reassemble and put in my 3000hz test tape and speed adjust as is needed 7. Realign head if it sounds of to get the crispest treble 8. Run a dry cleaner tape (in my case a TDK tape cleaner, no fluid) to pick up and bits 9. I then insert a battery powered tape head demagnetizer and run for around 2 minutes 10. Before I seal it up I will Faderlube the switched and the record bar and work it rigorously a few times Job done
Nice project. I did one of these myself years ago. It’s an immense amount of work, as everything has to be taken apart, including desoldering the circuit board. Still, it was definitely rewarding, as it’s a very unique boombox/walkman. I keep it alongside an RX-2000; in practice, I actually prefer the sound of the latter when played through its speaker, the sound is fuller. One annoying issue was that, after just a few years, the player stopped being able to fast-forward. That’s likely because the belts I used weren’t of very good quality. To this day, it still plays tapes, though unfortunately, it can’t fast-forward or rewind. For me, it’s sitting on my super long list of projects. Have fun with the repairs and be sure to take lots of photos!
I appreciate all the advice so far. I love the RX-2700, both for its historical significance and its Japanese camera-like build quality. I own 4 used ones and a pristine NOS unit in the original box with the original square headphones. After watching the Techmoan video a year or so ago, I was terrified to even touch one for repair. Yesterday, I decided to tear into the most damaged one with reckless abandon. I wasn’t worried if it ended up in the parts box - and to my surprise, it just wasn’t that hard. Tedious, yes - but not nearly as hard as Matt at Techmoan made it look. So I ordered several sets of quality belts and I’m gonna get as many of them running as I can.
As far as the mechanism goes, it's the same as the one in this thread: https://stereo2go.com/forums/threads/infinity-walkman-restoration.6958/ So everything presented there also applies to the RX-2700. There are quite a few things to do apart from replacing the belts, especially the clutch spring and lubrication. Depending on batch, market and generation of the unit, some of them may also have leaking caps, esepcially if it uses the Matsushita brand ones.
I think Techmoan scared everyone on this model and prices dropped. Mine must be an older version, it has "National Panasonic" above the counter and the National "N" Logo where yours says Panasonic. It also says "RX-2700" under the counter. I love the old Panasonic metal-edged buttons in the 70's, it makes them look beefy.
To me, the RX-2700 has the build quality of a good Japanese camera. The build precision for a 1980 cassette player is astounding.
I've always had a thing for the big old chunky models. Like you said, some have a lot of prercision moving parts very similar to the super-popular, and crazy world of cameras of the late 70's and early 80's. If you like this model, the very similar RX-1950, RX-1955 and RX-1960 are also respectable. The main difference is the lack of a speaker but they also have a radio and those tiny sliding switches. These things are heavy, I always have to check if I left batteries in them.
Do any of the ones you mentioned have metal bodies? The partial metal body of the RX-2700 really does it for me. Metal exudes quality! As an aside, in one of my RX-2700’s I discreetly upgraded the internal speaker with a modern 50mm. Big difference in the sound quality. It went from unlistenably tinny to “that sounds decent for its size.” Awhile back I also did a custom stereo enclosure for one of RX-2700’s complete with 2 very good speakers and a small sub. A very fun project. https://stereo2go.com/forums/threads/insanely-rare-rx-2700c-micro-hi-fi-boombox.10362/#post-84385 I freaking love the 2700.
I got a little curious and checked out some other similar Panasonics and the RQ-J36 has some metal on the front and the J3 has a big chunky metal side panel with the buttons. One thing cool about Panasonic is when you set them side x side there's almost a linear size difference. I can see management say, make it 20% smaller and that's exactly what they did. Recording portables have always been one of my favorites, they were unobtanium in the 80's in my part of the world. The J36 is a brick but then they also added on a stereo MIC to make it look professional. If you like tiny antennas, the later Panasonics have antennas even smaller than the RX-2700.
Do you have any RX-2000? They were in the same catalogs, I can't tell the difference maybe no stereo or recording? I'd post a photo but we're still out of memory.......
There’s a magic about these little machines that I can’t quite put my finger on. I too love the models that record and have a built-in speaker. They feel like micro mono boomboxes. And yes, those tiny antennas are so much fun. I love the entire aesthetic of these tiny wonder machines. I also have a thing for units that have an included carry case…and the 2700 has a great one. Very form fitting and nicely made. As far as I can tell, the only difference between the RX-2000 and RX-2700 is mono vs. stereo. The 2000 is mono through the headphones, the 2700 is stereo. I’d like to add a 2000 to my collection at some point but they rarely show up on eBay. The few I have seen were clapped-out junkers.
I can certainly understand the respect for those units. They are among the best-feeling, highest-quality units out there, pleasantly heavy, with a metal internal drive mechanism and a significant amount of metal on the exterior as well. The RX-2000 is similar in that regard; I recall that replacing the drive belts on that model was a bit easier. But, the RX-2000 is strictly mono. It also came with a beautiful travel hard case. One thing I do find a pity is that they didn’t include a digital clock with alarm. That would have made it the perfect travel companion for business trips for instance much like the Hitachi build Philips D8000 micro cassette boombox for example. The RQ-J36 does feature a metal drive mechanism, but its exterior is largely plastic; to me, it doesn't feel nearly as high-quality. In terms of build quality, the Sanyo M5550 is perhaps the closest equivalent to the RX-2700 in the world of Walkmans. I also really like these before 1981 cassette players
The 2700 is a pleasure to hold. It just feels great in your hands. Solid. Heavy. Metal. I own a lot of boomboxes / personal cassette players and the 2700 is in my top 3 favorites. as for the wish list - it would have been nice to have had a higher quality sounding mono speaker, but I suppose that was more a limitation of the technology back in the day. Type I / Type II switch and Dolby like the 2700’s sister ship the Infinity Intimate would have been great too. The Dolby paradox - I look for cassette players with Dolby and get SUPER EXCITED when it’s included, yet I NEVER use it, as it functions more as a treble kill switch. I think I associate Dolby with a generally higher-end player and I think it’s why I like to see it. I have a Harmon Kardon TD-292 cassette deck that I use to make cassettes for playback in my players and I don’t even record in Dolby.
I love all the little ones with speakers, they're kind of the missing link between Walkman and Boomboxes. There were several that were very similar to the RX-2700, I recently scored a super-rare Toshiba that is almost identical in size to the RX but it has two speakers and a handle, maybe the smallest (traditional) boombox? Hopefully we can post photos soon, maybe we can start a "micro-boombox" thread to show off these tiny wonders.
Regarding re-capping it depends on the type of components and assembly technique used originally. With through hole capacitors the heat is applied to the opposite side of the board to the capacitors when the board is soldered. With surface mount someone had the bright idea of simply flattening then bending the leads in a plastic carrier. During soldering het is then applied all around the component. Unsurprisingly that put a lot of thermal stress on the seals at the bottom of the capacitors which started to fail and leak after about a decade. I think things have improved now but the switch to surface mount wasn't as simple as the manufacturers originally thought.
