A little help with my very old sony tc-133

Hello guys, I hope that someone with a little bit more experience with cassette stereo could help me with some minor problems that I have with this system.

Long story short, I decided to buy this 1972 cassette because was fairly nice to see and at a decent price. 

It works and the sound is not bad for a 50 years old piece of equipment BUT, because there is always a but, it has quite a bit of wow and flutter.

Now, I changed the belt with a cheap one found on amazon, and cleaned the roller as much as I could, but I don't know if there is anything else that I could do to mitigate or solve this problem.          So, any advice is welkome! 

AFAIK the tape speed is primarily controlled by the roller/ idler, and not at all by the motor (since the tape reel diameter constantly changes). So a W+F problem surely has to be with the roller/ idler ?

Of course you might try some different tapes, just in case you’re using one badly wrapped cassette tape, and try some full Fast Forward/ Fast Reverse just in case it’s the cassette tape itself…

Problem with these sort of mechanisms is also with any of the old rubbers which degrade over time…. 

38 minutes ago, krass said:

AFAIK the tape speed is primarily controlled by the roller/ idler, and not at all by the motor (since the tape reel diameter constantly changes). So a W+F problem surely has to be with the roller/ idler ?

 

Of course you might try some different tapes, just in case you’re using one badly wrapped cassette tape, and try some full Fast Forward/ Fast Reverse just in case it’s the cassette tape itself…

 

Problem with these sort of mechanisms is also with any of the old rubbers which degrade over time…. 

Hello Krass, 

Many thanks for the advice!

I'm waiting for some new belts that "should" be a little bit better, and when I will open it again maybe I can take some photos, just as future memories. 

The roller it's quite a bit shiny, so it could be that it's mostly him the cause of the wow. I will try to understand how to change it. I mean, if I try to record a single constant tone, I can hear the "up and down" very clearly.

I tried different cassettes, both for recording and from albums, and regardless the problem is present, so I'm quite sure that is a problem of mechanic/used components.  

I was thinking of trying to put some contact oil in the motor, but I'm not really sure that is a good idea.