Read below for a tip on how to repair noisy recordings on a Nakamichi BX-100 cassette deck.
I recently purchased a Nakamichi BX-100 cassette deck off Facebook market for $40. The seller listed the item “as is” because the unit played tapes fine, but when a tape was recorded on the machine, it would play back with crackling noise throughout, especially on the right channel.
How to repair noisy recordings on a Nakamichi BX-100 cassette deck?
To remove the noise from recordings, clean the cassette deck’s heads, capstan, pinch roller, recording input sliders and the relay switch. Read below for step by step instructions.
Below are the steps I took to repair the noisy recording issue:
Clean the heads, capstan and pinch roller.
Before I start working on a cassette deck with any noise issues, I always start with cleaning the tape heads, the capstan and pinch roller.
This machine was rather dusty inside and I could see dirt on all of the above mentioned parts. I cleaned them thoroughly but unfortunately the noise was still present when recording.
Clean the Record Level sliding switches.
The BX-100 has two sliding switches on the right hand side of the machine that controls the sound input level when recording.
I thought those might be dirty which could cause noise during recording.
I removed the top of the case and sprayed Deoxit around the sliding switches. Note, it’s hard to tell exactly where to spray without removing the entire circuit board. I sprayed around the area enough to make sure the Deoxit would reach the switches.
I moved the sliding switches up and down many times in order to clean.
After my next test recording on to tape, I noticed the sound had improved, but there was still a lot of noise in the right channel.
Clean the relay switch!
After researching online, I read about the relay switch causing issues for people in the past.
I located the relay switch on the far upper right corner of the unit (see photo).
I was able to pop the clear plastic top off the relay switch using a small screwdriver.
I sprayed the relay switch with Deoxit and used the nail file in the photo above to clean in between the contacts located at the top of the relay switch. These were too hard to photograph but you can see them on either side once the top is removed. They will be closed so I moved the nail file in between the closed contacts to clean them.
Success
After cleaning the contacts in the relay switch, I no longer heard the fuzzy crackling noise on my recordings.
How Does The Nakamichi BX-100 Sound?
Nakamichi cassette decks are expensive, especially the Dragon and ZX models.
In all my years of buying cassette decks, I rarely see affordable Nakamichi decks near me. I’ve wanted to hear what the hype was about so I decided to look for the lower end models and work my way up from there.
I’ve found that the lower end models like the CR-1A and the BX-100 will perform excellent, especially compared to models like Sony or Kenwood that you can usually find in thrift stores.
The recordings I’ve made on my CR-1A sound amazing and I paid less than $100 for it. This BX-100 machine also makes excellent recordings.
Obviously these machines are not high end 3 head units with a lot of bells and whistles like the expensive Nakamichi models, but if you can find one for a good price, pick it up. You won’t be disappointed!
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