Factory radio with eq and cassette player in my 85 T/A..Radio and eq work fine, but when I insert a tape it immediately ejects! Any idea of what's wrong would be appreciated!

 

Broken belt(s). #1 issue with the Blaupunkt tape unit.

 

The main problem is that you're playing cassettes. No one does that anymore...

 

Funny...some do...even if you have cd's or better!
It's there...why not??

 

Once you have the unit out of the car and the cover removed, a good old 'eyeball inspection' will usually find the problem---an obviously broken or bent part. As Drew stated in post #2, the most likely---and most failure-prone---part is the drive belt. Finding a replacement may prove to be difficult; try any shop that specializes in working on consumer stereo electronics.

If you're lucky enough to find the problem and then any needed repair part(s), before you reinstall the unit, clean the entire tape path with q-tips and isopropyl alcohol. Back in the day, special CFC tape head and transport cleaner was available, but EPA has since pulled it off the market.

 

You know many bands today still release albums on cassette?

 

REO Speedwagon and The Styx aren’t that relevant these days

 

REO is awesome! Saw them in concert 2 years ago!!

 

You can try to replace the belts,..... but it's almost certainly not going to correct the problem. I'd expect the mechanism to need to be replaced.

I've attempted to replace old belts on head units with the Blaupunkt cassette deck MANY MANY times and the problem you describe still remains. In most cases the IR LED goes bad causing the cassette mechanism to reject the tape. The "bad belt" advise in regards to these cassette mechs spitting out tapes is just bad advise picked up & repeated by parrots that learned about this 'fix' after reading that theory on the web over and over again. The REAL learning experience happens when the attempted belt swap is attempted - and fails.

Removing / replacing the IR LED is a PITA,....... better off replacing the cassette mechanism IMO.

 

Thanks! Are you aware of anybody near the Detroit area that repairs these, or anybody that they can be sent to? Any idea on $$$??

 

lol. I was born in 76 so you could say I have a soft spot for REO as well 😂

 

I don't bother to fix them myself. I always try to install good belts - even knowing that it never works - and then toss the cassette mech when the belts don't work. Replacing the IR LED is a big-time PITA and not worth the trouble ------> IMO.

United Radio, M&R, or maybe even 'doctor Don' might still do repair work on these,... it's a GM "Type D" cassette deck. ( used in all Thirdgen UX1 or 91-92 Camaro UM6 ) The cassette belt specs for the Blaupunkt cassette mechanism:

2 belts: AV-SBS4.9 & AV-SBS9.2


( a pretty complete belt listing from Kens electronics ) https://kenselectronics.com/lists/belts.htm


Edit: After working at my bench today fixing another members radio I took this pic; The dead type 'D' cassette mechs shown circled in RED are the cassette mechanisms I've pulled in the last month or so. All of them spit the tape and would not play and installing good belts did nothing to fix the problem. I could have saved the 20 or 30 of them that I've tried to install belts in,... but I've only got enough spare room for a few dead units so I keep the best of the dead mechanisms for small parts.

 

Oh yes, everyone recommends replacing the belts when it's never the belts, even when the belts are obviously broken and need to be replaced. Some people's kids.

Replacing the broken belt(s) has been the fix for these decks for decades. Is it possible for more than one part to fail? Sure, you betcha. But if the belts are bad, the deck will spit the tape right back out again. If the belts rotted after something else failed, well that's not exactly the fault of the person advising to replace the belts, now is it?

We're talking about making a 30 year old cassette deck work. Everything rubber is going to be dried out and failing, potentially nylon will be dried out and failing. There are electrical components that could be past their expected service life, etc. There are plenty of possible reasons the deck might not work. The first thing to dry out and fail back in the day was the belts. Replacing the belts back when the rest of the deck wasn't 150 years old was a valid and common fix. Often you could take the deck out of the car, prop the tape shutter open and see the broken belt, or hold it upside down and parts of the belt would fall out.

At this point, if the belts haven't been replaced you can bank on them being bad. But that's not to say something else hasn't failed before or after the belts that will still prevent the deck from working. Just because Johnny Comelately that just started working on Delco decks in the past few years hasn't had luck with replacing the belts, doesn't automatically undo the decades that replacing the belts usually cured that problem.

What an *******.

 

Could you possibly tell me the model number of the radio with the 4 buttons? I will call M&R on Tuesday.

 

I don't know the model number of an 85 Trans Am Radio off the top of my head, but if you tell them the radios RPO code = 'UX1',.... they will know what your talking about.

 

Took the radio over to M&R today. They seemed like good people. Said it would be just a couple of days before it is ready. Thanks for the recommendation!

 

Actually saw an article fairly recently about cassettes making a bit of a comeback. Not really sure why, as cassettes to me didn't sound as good as vinyl and obviously not as good as a CD. I guess maybe a nostalgia factor. Cassettes were kind of nice in that you could throw them around your car and not worry about scratching them up. Easier to change on the fly than a CD too.

I use the player in my GTA. Some of my cassettes, the newest of which was bought in 1994, are deteriorating, but most still sound good. I had been throwing them away when I had the same music on CD or download, if I still wanted that music. I never figured I'd need cassettes again. Then I bought my GTA in February of 2018, so my remaining cassettes (about 70 of them) have a new life.

 

I know the sound isn't as good, but I like the fact that you can advance or rewind, which you can't do with a CD. I have about 200 cassettes! I mostly listen to the sounds of my car anyways!!

 

Got the radio back from M&R already! Just re installed it back in the car. Everything is perfect!! M&R are great people to work with! Reasonable, fast and nice!! I am a happy camper!!! Thanks John!!