From: ohg...@gmail.com   
      
   On Sunday, February 18, 2024 at 9:40:01 PM UTC-5, Jacob Macheca wrote:   
   > So some of my VHS play perfectly fine on my VCR, but others have picture   
   that repeatedly goes to static and cuts out, then comes back and does it all   
   over again. And, it only rewinds when the tape is playing, not when it   
   stopped. All the other    
   functions work fine, I can't seem to figure out what the issue is   
      
      
   Most of those types of complaints were from playing back tapes that were   
   recorded at different speeds and played back on a multi head VCR - 4 head VCRs   
   would often use one pair of heads for two speeds and the other head for one   
   speed - so a single weak    
   or dirty head would affect playback on some tapes but not all.  You can try   
   cleaning the heads (look up how to do it - the head drum is machined chrome   
   but the heads are tiny fragile things that spin in the track between the upper   
   and lower head drum).   
      
   A dirty upper or lower drum can also cause some stiction on some formulations   
   of tape and not others or tapes with varying level of wear.  Cleaning the   
   sticky crud along the whole tape path including head drum, audio/control head,   
   guides, brake follower,    
   etc. will relieve stiction.   
      
   Other issues that can cause glitchy playback include misalignment of the fixed   
   control head, dirty control head, worn control head, or failing electrical   
   components in the control circuitry or capstan drive circuitry.   
      
   The rewind problem is mechanical.  Depending on the exact transport you have,   
   it probably uses a different drive for slack takeup during play and full   
   rewind mode.  Most likely the swing idler will need to be replaced/renewed at   
   least.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)