I have a Denon cassette deck and it has lost its hub retainers. These appear to be tiny little plastic circles with a hole in the middle that push over a spindle and slip into a narrow part on the spindle to stop the hubs coming too far out when you eject the tapes. I have tried tiny O rings, but these are too thick and put too much friction on the hub/spindle interface, IE the spindles are fixed, only the hubs rotate. Brian
Brian Gaff was thinking very hard :
Circlips?
At some point in my dim & distant, I seem to recollect using copper wire for this purpose. One turn and twist, but bend the twist up to reduce friction.
As for the size of the wire, I can't help. The wire would have come from an old transformer or choke. Copper wire can be reduced in diameter by stretching BTW
Personally I would scrap the Denon, if the retainers have worn out as opposed to being butchered during belt replacement, then the drive motor has been on borrowed time for years.
Cassette decks do not "lose" hub retainers incidentally, Einstein some time back postulated that your hub retainers are still with us in some form. Have you looked really hard for them?
HN
No, these are much thinner and have no gap. Brian
I'm sure they are around, but no the machine is not worn out. They bit the dust due to a faulty tape getting jammed. The machine, a dual capstan three motor jobbie is fine but every time I eject the left spool tends to come with the tape and has to be pushed back on. Unfortunately, anything not completely seamless will not do due to a small nick is each center of hub where the moving bit locates on it. Any projection like a wire or circle will inevitably ping and cause wow.
Brian
A single twist of a spring, clipped from one in a box of many springs saved in case they came in useful?
Thomas Prufer
Got any beady-eyed friends?
Bill
The problem is that they are like most small objects, by the time you notice they are gone, they are really gone. Besides, if they were still any good they would not have fallen off in the first place. Its so often the case that a nice bit of design is ruined by one little poorly chosen part. Brian
Hmm, well, its that little raw edge that is often the problem but worth a thought I suppose. I see no reason why they did not designee it with a bigger spindle and a washer in front of a normal circlip. Just a bit of bad design in an otherwise nice one. Brian
I expect that the design might be common to many cassette players - so it might be worth finding a few junk units (freecycle etc.) of lesser quality to see if they'll provide the parts.
Are you sure that the retainers aren't assembled from the back? i.e. take spindle, thread on retainer, then hub, then attach to chassis, then fit drive gear or pulley on the reverse side?
cheers
Jules
Brian, at the risk of stating the obvious, have you tried asking Denon?
Bert
Thinking out the box how about cutting a small piece of plastic in the diameter of the thing and just pressing it on allowing the spindle to punch the hole.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.