To anyone with the OEM cassette head unit...does the manual recommend any specific cleaning procedure, or brand of cleaner for the tape path? Or has anyone had great results with their own cleaning procedure?

Any advice would be of great help, I want to keep my tapes sounding crisp!

 

I don't think the OEM deck is unique in that it requires any special equipment for cleaning.

During my cassette days, I had good results with the wet type cleaners. I also had a electronic head de-magnetizer.

 

What exactly is a "wet type" cleaner?

 

long swab + head cleaner (ie: alcohol).

 

Tape deck? Those still come in cars?

 

Actually, that method can be problematic for car cassette players, because the playback head is usually retracted into the guts of the player unless there's actually a tape inserted. You might be able to reach the retracted head with a swab, but you might not.

Most of the "wet-type" cleaners suitable for car use are the ones comprised of a regular cassette shell loaded with a fibrous "leader-type" tape instead of regular magnetic tape. You put a few drops of cleaning solution on the fiber tape and then pop the cassette into your player. The wet part of the tape cleans off the playback head, and then the rest of the tape dries off the head.

 

Yep - even in the MINI:

 

Wait....yours looks different than mine

 

that is classic, got any Three dog night.

 

Wow - that's actually pretty fancy for an 8-track player.

But here's one that'll blow your mind. In the late 80's, my boss had an old Jeep (the kind that have sort of a pickup bed in the back), and he had an 8-track player. That's not so surprising, but it was an *Alpine* 8-track player. It was kind of like seeing a Hewlett-Packard abacus.

 

Sure do!!

 

Wow - you've really got to be a Three Dog Night fan to have anything other than their "Best Of" album - I think all of their good stuff made it on there, so there's not much reason to have the others. (Just off the top of my head, I recognize at least 9 of the 12 "Golden Bisquits" tracks that are also on "Best Of".)

That's one of the few albums that I currently have on vinyl, cassette, and CD (no 8-track, through )

 

Scott-

Yeah, I figured the most likely option would be the cassette-shell type cleaners. Do you have a specific brand you like to use?

Any advice for demagnetizing the tape path, how do you reach the tape heads if they're that far back?

 

Well, looking around, it appears that all of the head cleaners I have are no longer in production. Your best bet would probably be to go to Radio Shack and see what they have. I know I was able to get reel-to-reel tape and vinyl album slipcovers at Radio Shack for *years* after everyone else stopped carrying them. (In fact, as late as 1990, you could go into any Radio Shack store and have them order you an 8-track player!)

As for demagnetizing the tape path, there are cassette-shell-based demagnetizers as well. There are (were?) even ones that would do both cleaning and demagnetizing in a single pass.

 

For home decks a cotton swab and some rubbing alcohol does the trick b/c you can easily see the head.

But a car deck is a different story so cassette shell type where you put a couple of drops of cleaning fluid is a good choice. I checked radioshack.com and they had a few models to choose from.

To de-magnatize, you might wanna look for a electronic type. I had one that was a clear cassette shell with a circuit board inside powered by a watch battery.