20 Most Recent Panasonic AG-1980 S-VHS VCR Questions & Answers

Try powering it down first.

Don't it is fine the way it is.

It hates what you have put into it. OBB SEEN

Load mechanism may have frozen up and gears no longer function. Try 10D contract spray.

In many Panasonic models that means the tape did not withdraw when unloading. If this is the case then it could be the loading motor or mode switch that's the problem.

these decks are notorious for bad surface mount capacitors in the video and servo circuits. there will be quite a few that will need to be replaced. if you cant do it yourself, it will probably cost too much to repair. you will need access to an esr meter (pasive capacitor checker that checks the capacitor in circuit and the part does not have to be removed), a good soldering iron with a small tip, flux, thin solder, hemostats,solderwick blue and patients. the capacitors in question are the little round silver capacitors soldered directly to the boards. test all caps and locate caps with bad readings and mark them as bad but dont cover up the value marked on the top.the voltage is listed as a letter followed by the series of cap.(eg: 16 jhb would be a 16 mfd, j voltage rating, hb series cap) you can buy these caps cheap from digikey online. you need to be very careful when replacing the caps as if you do it wrong you will pull a trace and have to do major jumper wire work to replace the broken trace. the key to removing the bad cap is to grab them with the hemostats and squeeze, once the hemostats have a good grip of the cap start spinning the cap, dont pull just spin.you are trying to break the leads. once they break take your hot iron and wipe off what is left of the cap leads, let it cool and go back and remove remaining solder with the solderwick. clean the spot on board where cap was with anhydrous alcohol to clean any fluid that leaked out of the cap and made it bad. gently grab replacement cap with hemostats so you can hold it and apply flux to bottom of leads, place cap in its place watching polarity( black line on cap is negative and lines up with solid white side of silksceen on board or opposite the little plus on the board, if there is not a line on the cap or if there is a small "n" on the board it is a non polarized cap and direction does not matter)put a small(SMALL)amount of solder on your iron and touch it to the remaining exposed lead. if you fluxed enough and you used the correct amount of solder it should jump to the lead and leave a small shiny round solder joint. practice makes perfect and this will fix your problem. you may have to replace 40 to 50 caps maybe more, depends on how many are bad. good luck with your repair, 1980's were good decks!

These are good old VCRs probably in need of a belt overhaul.

Try unpluging the unit for 2 minutes and see if the error message is reset.

I think you might have a K-Deck model. You will find information on line about this.
I think it's probably one of two things. First damage to the carriage that lifts the tape in and out or damage elsewhere. It could be connected to the mode switch in both cases. As damage can cause the timing to be out. The mode switch can also cause trouble.

VCR's have a thing called a mode switch. This tells the electronics of the machine want position the mechanical section is in. If it gets wrong signals then the VCR electronics power the machine down. These wrong signals are often caused by damage to any part of the VCR mechanical section. Perhaps in this case something to do with the carriage unit. But the switch itself can go wrong. A visual inspection inside might reveal damage to some part of the VCR.

Most likely problem is a shorted filter capacitor in the power supply.

There's only one way to tell what's wrong with and that's to take the top off and look inside. There are lots of things that can go wrong with the mechanism, such as plastic parts broken and tape entanglement. But looking inside is the only way to tell what's gone wrong. You can then give us a fixya more info so we can help you get it working again.

that would indicate an electronical problem. Usually caused by burnt out capacitor or resistors on the main circuit board. There are also other electronical components in the machine. These components will keep the machine in track. Everything is syncronized. If one of the components should fail, everything will be out of sync and testing with a vom meter will be needed to determine which component(s) are burnt out causing the machine not to react properly.

Personally haven't heard of the drive belts doing that before! However I wouldn't rule it out. You can find drive belts online easy enough. All you need to do is go inside the unit, take any off (remember how the go on) and measure the belt's diameter. Then put "vcr drive belt (45mm)" (insert correct figure here) into Google.
However I would also find the mode switch and spray it with Servisol Video 40, I will post a picture of what it MAY look like below.

The first thing that comes to mind when such a thing happens is a bad/dirty tape reading head. Did you try using a head cleaner to see if it resolves the issue?

Sai.

the tape deck has jumped timing and can cost 40 to 100 dollars depending on how quick it takes the tech

If it is not a bad soldering joint somewhere, it could be the mode switch. They can sometimes be cleaned with Servisol Video 40, but you might have to replace it.

It sounds like the video heads are dirty, or the tracking is off. I would first try adjusting the tracking to see if it can be corrected. If that does not work then I would clean the video heads using a video head cleaner (Radio Shack) You could also try a different tape to see if it that could be the reason. Also double check you video connections to your monitor to make sure they are good. If all of this fails than it may have to be checked out at an authorized Panasonic repair facility!

I hope this helps and good luck!