Tony L
Administrator
My next restoration project is a bit of ‘80s cassette nostalgia...
I had one of these back in the ‘90s after my previous Marantz CP230 portable’s pitch went mad. Obviously no one ‘needs’ a cassette deck in 2020, but they are nice bits of retro engineering and there is quite a niche retro-cult emerging around them at present. Some great YouTube channels etc, plus the TapeHeads forum. As such when this Walkman Pro appeared in the classifieds a couple of days ago in mostly working condition for a reasonable price I snagged it. It plays fine with nice solid pitch stability (a known area of failure), but nothing other than a bit of motor noise when winding (i.e. the reel mech doesn’t twitch even without a tape in). Interesting as the take-up reel works fine in playback. Anyway I have a set of belts and idlers on order, so will hopefully get that aspect working ok.
Thanks to the Tapehead forum I have figured out there are at least four different versions of the WM-D6C. The very first one had phenolic through-hole boards and a rather pointed 35711 Amorphous head, the second the same boards and rounder 35711 Amorphous head, the third green glass fibre boards, SMD components and 35711 head, and finally the fourth version with a cheaper 35712 or even unmarked permalloy head that was apparently less hard-wearing and the ‘Amorphous head’ branding on the front removed. The consensus is earlier is better, many even preferring the very old original WM-D6 (i.e. no Dolby C), but earlier is also older, so more chance of wear, failing components etc.
The one I have here looks to be a Mk IV, so green SMD boards and the 35712 head (which thankfully looks to be in great condition), though it does retain the ‘Amorphous Head’ brand on the front, so who knows? The 517103 serial number suggests this is a very late one indeed, maybe towards the end of production (the D6C was made up until 2002). I only had a very quick look in the bottom just to establish what I have here. I’ll not dismantle it further until I have the belt & idler kit, and even then I plan to do as little as possible. The tape counter works, so I’ll leave that be as it is a total PITA to get to! I won’t know what visual state the SMD caps are in until I get in there, the one I could see from the side looked clean, but there are a lot in there. The only through-hole cap I could see was a Rubycon and it looked fine. SMD recapping is beyond my skillset, so if there is leakage I’ll end up paying for a full service. I’ll only worry about that if there is any obvious leakage as it does certainly play fine, so I’m hoping I can fix it with a belt & idler change.
The headphone amp seems very good, it has no issue with the inefficient HD-414s.
I’m hoping this takes a lot less restoration than a TD-124!
PS Edited as I had some version info wrong!
I had one of these back in the ‘90s after my previous Marantz CP230 portable’s pitch went mad. Obviously no one ‘needs’ a cassette deck in 2020, but they are nice bits of retro engineering and there is quite a niche retro-cult emerging around them at present. Some great YouTube channels etc, plus the TapeHeads forum. As such when this Walkman Pro appeared in the classifieds a couple of days ago in mostly working condition for a reasonable price I snagged it. It plays fine with nice solid pitch stability (a known area of failure), but nothing other than a bit of motor noise when winding (i.e. the reel mech doesn’t twitch even without a tape in). Interesting as the take-up reel works fine in playback. Anyway I have a set of belts and idlers on order, so will hopefully get that aspect working ok.
Thanks to the Tapehead forum I have figured out there are at least four different versions of the WM-D6C. The very first one had phenolic through-hole boards and a rather pointed 35711 Amorphous head, the second the same boards and rounder 35711 Amorphous head, the third green glass fibre boards, SMD components and 35711 head, and finally the fourth version with a cheaper 35712 or even unmarked permalloy head that was apparently less hard-wearing and the ‘Amorphous head’ branding on the front removed. The consensus is earlier is better, many even preferring the very old original WM-D6 (i.e. no Dolby C), but earlier is also older, so more chance of wear, failing components etc.
The one I have here looks to be a Mk IV, so green SMD boards and the 35712 head (which thankfully looks to be in great condition), though it does retain the ‘Amorphous Head’ brand on the front, so who knows? The 517103 serial number suggests this is a very late one indeed, maybe towards the end of production (the D6C was made up until 2002). I only had a very quick look in the bottom just to establish what I have here. I’ll not dismantle it further until I have the belt & idler kit, and even then I plan to do as little as possible. The tape counter works, so I’ll leave that be as it is a total PITA to get to! I won’t know what visual state the SMD caps are in until I get in there, the one I could see from the side looked clean, but there are a lot in there. The only through-hole cap I could see was a Rubycon and it looked fine. SMD recapping is beyond my skillset, so if there is leakage I’ll end up paying for a full service. I’ll only worry about that if there is any obvious leakage as it does certainly play fine, so I’m hoping I can fix it with a belt & idler change.
The headphone amp seems very good, it has no issue with the inefficient HD-414s.
I’m hoping this takes a lot less restoration than a TD-124!
PS Edited as I had some version info wrong!