JVC HRS8000 SVHS Service

[@tekvax01]

Jean Michael Jarre is one of my most favourite musicians! I finally got to see him in concert in Toronto a couple of years ago! Amazing!

[@12voltvids]

I would go see him if he ever comes out west.

[@Watcher3223]

@@12voltvids Nice. Just remember: when we need to breathe, we need Oxygene...

[@Davethreshold]

I bought that machine when it first came out. It was over a grand. It was an absolute BEAST! I used it daily to record/play my favorite shows for almost ten years, with no problems. That was at least 2-3 hours/day for ten years. It had one problem: Now and then it would snap the tape off after rewinding! You may note it does not wind down at the end like the next models did.

[@douglashoff95]

Having worked on these gave me a whole new outlook on patience.

[@guitareveryone]

Boy you’ve got more patience than me to work on that thing! I owned a later model JVC VHS (not SVHS) that had those dropout issues and had the same service done to repair it. Mine also had an issue where the remote would stop working after so many minutes. Was sent off to JVC for repair and returned saying they couldn’t find an issue. Plugged it in and same problem. My local service dealer found it was a bad trace in the circuit board that when you lifted the corner of the VCR it would work and stop working as soon as it was set down. I eventually sold it figuring I wasn’t waiting for the next issue. I eventually bought a SVHS Hi Fi HRS-9500U that has given me good service until recently when fast forwarding tape and putting into play mode creates slack and spills tape into the machine . But it’s an old machine and has been stored for the most of its several years with little use so it’s to be expected.

[@12voltvids]

These were not reliable machines. None of the old heavy units are. Too much to go wrong and a bitch to repair. My advice is stay away from these dogs.

[@waltchan]

@@12voltvids Were Mitsubishi HS-U70 and HS-U80 any better than JVC?

[@12voltvids]

@@waltchan I forget which chassis those models had. Most of the mitsubushi were very reliable for years then they took a small slide near the end.

[@waltchan]

This unit was made in February 1989 manufactured date, one of the last JVCs built with this mechanism chassis.

[@njm1971nyc]

Man, you are NOT wrong about JVC. All my VHS decks are pro/industrial models (SV0-5800, that kind of thing, all with plug-in circuit boards), but I needed a relatively high-quality deck for EP tape playback (EP makes me want to weep, but we get all sorts of archive crap on VHS that we have to turn into 1080p ProRes for tv documentaries and so on). So, I bought a BR-S378U. Outwardly, beautifully made. Once the swinging pendulum rew/ff gear was cleaned/lubed it was working great. But then I noticed the hifi audio was rather low and slightly dull-sounding. Probably caps in the hifi circuit. So I begin disassembly....YIKES...what an absolute DOGS DINNER. Boards all over the place, spaghetti everywhere. You can't even open up the main board without dragging a bunch of sub-boards with it. Truly the worst design I've EVER seen. Come to think of it, the old BR-7000 duplicator decks were a spaghetti mess too, but at least the boards were somewhat accessible. This "prosumer" JVC is HIDEOUS inside. "Nil Points" to JVC, as they say on Eurovision. Thank god I usually only have to work on professional equipment! I'm amazed the BR-S378U even powered on again after the trauma of disassembly/reassembly! Ughhhhhh!!

[@alexanderherget6303]

Now while your at it, now your gotta fix yours to right ;). Naw. :). Awesome video. Not a lot of people would want or could fix one of those. Well done.👍

[@12voltvids]

Mine is not getting fixed.

[@alexanderherget6303]

@@12voltvids You're absolutely right.

[@DK640OBrianYT]

I would *absolutely love* to have one of these 1987/88-vintage JVC HR-S8000 machines in such a prestine and nice cosmetic condition. They were manufactored for the US market, whereas we here in Europe had to wait for the JVC HR-S5000 machines to arrive for the consumer market in 1989. Pre-production machines were available for review in the appropriate Audio/Video-tech magazines during the Fall/Autumn 1988. If anyone could hook me up with an American JVC HR-S8000U in cosmetic mint/near mint condition, let me know.

[@tacofortgens3471]

You dont

[@teacfan1080]

Yikes, a person could get lost in there! Amazing how they ever managed to put something like that together. I bet this went for a pretty penny when it was new.

[@12voltvids]

Yes they were expensive and no they were not very reliable.

[@rwj777]

I thought about getting one of these, if I seen one in the wild somewhere, but I'm glad that I watched this video first. Lol 👍🏾

[@TechnicFreakJulian]

I would still recommend getting one cause they are even cool to have just for decorating purposes

[@rwj777]

@@TechnicFreakJulian I always liked the way this machine look, that's why I always wanted one, but I had no idea that they were so unreliable and complex. If someone was giving one away, I wouldn't turn it down tho. These machines usually go for a big price on Ebay. I almost pulled the trigger on buying one, but I'm glad I didn't now.

[@mrnmrn1]

At least this one is not disintegrated yet. I have a Hitachi S895 S-VHS from the same era, similar board count and wire spaghetti (although it's more tidy with more connectors, the front comes off with zero wires attached to it IIRC), and every single board has a lot of leaking capacitors, all the boards are corroded to hell. I will have a run on it, but not with high hope. It has a very early digital Y/C processing board in it with tons of SMD ASICs and discrete frame buffer SRAM ICs, and the corrosion is quite bad on that board also, some fine pitch SMD ICs are swimming in an electrolyte sea for who knows how many years now. And it was operated quite a lot after the caps started leaking, as the previous owner seen some issues with it gradually coming up, first the HiFi audio went out, then the tracking became unstable, and he stopped using it only when the servo completely gave up and the head drum started spinning at about 1/4 of the rated speed. I bought the VHS version of it for parts, the F785, because it was cheap and came with a remote, which the S895 was missing, but the F785 came with even worse corrosion, it has blown up caps in the PSU (at least the PSU was still OK in the S895 last time I seen it).

[@12voltvids]

Well at least the craps are not leaking on this one.... yet. As I mentioned I was given one and I won't be restoring it any time soon.

[@Ukupnikzaza]

Nice job 👍

[@patricknicolucci5073]

Dave you are correct I've worked in the plastic industry, Phenolics in paper, linen or fiberglass glass. The fiberglass base phenolic PC board is G10 mil grade and far superior to Paper or Linen. and far more expensive. We cut G10 phenolic with a diamond encrusted circular saw blade .080 thick . FYI

[@Davethreshold]

Do you still repair VCR's? I have a JVC HRS-9900U. When I recorded LASERDISCS on it, it was REALLY HARD to tell the difference between the source and the recording. The first problem is, it will not take the tape in. I had to pop the lid and give it some help. I'm looking for somebody to rebuild it if need be. Please let me know. I'll make a separate post about this, HRS-8000 beast.

[@davidwinokur2131]

Whenever I see you bang on a chassis to check for a bad connection it reminds me a the time my cordless phone became intermittent. My (now ex) wife took the handset, complained about the fault and began banging it on the countertop. I told her, "That won't fix it." But, I was wrong. The next day there was a brand new, unmolested and fully functioning unit in it's place.

[@12voltvids]

Any tech that deservs to be called a tech use this technique to find faults.

[@davidwinokur2131]

@@12voltvids I like your methods because you don't depend on the latest and greatest technology, but primarily on your wits, reasoning and decades of experience.

[@johnlund2654]

I had several of those on my bench that would spill tape when ejecting the cassette. Never figured it out

[@12voltvids]

They were junk when they were still relatively new and they haven't gotten better with age.

[@zx8401ztv]

Yes there are a few p.c.b's in there, just a few lol. I have never seen a machine like that, but there were machines that had loads of Spagetti everywhere. The short wires that were soldered directly to pcb's was a pain, just could not get full access :-(

[@12voltvids]

When i see shit like this it reinforces my decision to get the hell out of the service business. When I got out in 2003 there was so much crap hitting the market they were built just like this circuit boards everywhere very short connectors couldn't do anything had like one inch of clearance to pull a board out oh terrible stuff I got so frustrated that I finally threw in the towel.

[@zx8401ztv]

There were cheap full height front loader vcr's made my orion (white pcb) , cheap yes but so dam easy to repair :-D Good thing you did jump out, the stress could have pushed you into a heart attack, now it's just a hobby for you. Stress is not something to be ignored. I got too much stress when i was the electronics repair section in a business, the stress drove me into mental illness, Took me years to recover.

[@12voltvids]

@@zx8401ztv I don't remember if i ever talked about what finially drove me out of the business or not. It wasn't the business shitting down. They are closed now but I left 10 years before the doors closed. Perhaps i will talk about that in the next video which will be a little old transistor radio restore.

[@StilltheOneTCF]

S-VCR is THAT brand.

[@AlexMirgorodskiy]

Good afternoon, dear guru! Your video led me to purchase this VCR model Victor HR-s8000. I have already implemented many solutions from this video of yours in my device. Many thanks to you for your work! Unfortunately, this device requires serious maintenance. So, the noise suppression system has short-term voltage emissions, but it is difficult to eliminate this malfunction without a service manual. Help me, please! If possible, put the service manual on the cloud either jvc hr-s8000 or jvc hr-s7000 or victor br-s3600 or hr-d630u or D530MS. Sincerely, Alexander.

[@12voltvids]

I don't have the manual.

[@AlexMirgorodskiy]

@@12voltvids Thanks for the information!

[@12voltvids]

I would never recommend buying this old crap. What many do not understand is that these high end machines were not very reliable when they were new. Time has not been good to any of them. If you absolutely need a VHS find the most recent vintage machine you can find. Sure there will be more plastic in them but the reliability was much better due to greatly reduced part count. Fewer parts both mechanical and electrical means less to go wrong. Also the signal processing circuits on the later machines resulted in a better picture than any of the early machines could ever dream of delivering. Same goes for old cameras. For archiving find a digital 8 with analog playback capability. Early 8mm hi8 cameras were loaded with leaky caps. Later models they had all switched to tantalum and ceramic. I know this just ruffled ebay sellers feathers that make a fortune selling this old crap to the naive buyers to think older is better and therefore worth more. I just recently saw a guy with a 1947 Bakelite radio asking $300 saying it's rare. I sent him a message asking him if he would like to buy the two that I have for a hundred a piece and then he could mark them up to 300 and make a profit. I bought the two that I have for 15.00, for both.

[@AlexMirgorodskiy]

@@12voltvids Good afternoon , guru! I apparently expressed myself inaccurately. Of course, you did not recommend purchasing this particular model. Of course it is not yours recomendations. But I myself assemble and repair magnetic sound recording devices (cassette decks, video recorders, DAT decks). It was enough for me to watch your video and want to find this device in my collection myself. Of course, after troubleshooting. Yes, time does not spare anyone, and magnetic recording devices suffer all the more from time. But. This month they brought me a very "young" Sony slv-se620. 1996. Weight 3 kilograms. All made of plastic, the tape tension stand is combined with the lever (also plastic) for opening the cassette cover. The stand broke off, the lower part of the plastic of the stand fell into the windings of the direct drive motor of the capstan, some of the windings shorted out to each other, the tape was crumpled (a very valuable record for the owner - his wedding ), the price of the device today is about 15 US dollars, the price of a direct drive for this device is about 100 US dollars. No point in repairing. My friend brought JVC HR-J627ms, it turned out that on the back panel the brand JVC HR-J727, the tape counter only works in ntsc mode, in other color systems the counter does not count at all, there are no (!!!) central cores in tulips for the audio signal input at all , this miracle can write sound only in ntsc at sp speed, in other modes the sound is not written at all. 1996. Friend bought this miracle for 250 US dollars. My test show a harmonic distortion coefficient of 0.1% on recording from a tape . Sound for an amateur. These are not my machines. I personally have a Panasonic NV fs900 and my test show that there are absolutely no differences between the signal applied to this device and the result on the tape. Harmonic distortion factor 0.009%. Perfect sound. And the tape drive mechanism of this device has an unlimited resource - it is all made of metal. 1986. And here is Victor 8000. Today, its harmonic distortion coefficient is 0.05% I will adjust, it will sing no worse than fs900. Sincerely, Alexander.

[@12voltvids]

@@AlexMirgorodskiy sure there was garbage made but also very good machines made into the 2000s. The old models however have many more points of failures. I use a JVC 9911 myself for archive work. It's a flimsy mechanism but as long as you load it carefully it works great. My ag1970 on the other hand, beyond repair as is my agw1 and they were expensive machines that just didn't last. Lots of JVC models the guide assemblies literally pulled apart.

[@GerardPinzone]

I bought a JVC S-VHS back in the day and it had those white lines FROM DAY ONE. I returned it and got another and it had the same problem out of the box. Could a bad ground at the outlet cause that issue, too?

[@videofun4651]

JVC had several generations of SVHS machines with the white streak problem. It started with the JVC HR S4900U/S6900U/HR S5100U/HR S7100U, and ran all the way up to the HR S9400U.

[@MrApril1977]

Hello. I bought a JVC BR-600E. Is the mechanism identical with the HRS8000? kind reagrds Ronny Lehmann

[@markhod1960]

the old G-Chasis / G Mechanism was a real pain to work on. I hated working on them.

[@12voltvids]

"G" as in Garbage

[@crashbandicoot4everr]

Yeah the G mechanism. Take the front loading mechanism out, align the gears at the bottom into the stop/half-loaded position with millions of timing marks, and then replace the front loading mechanism in the down/loaded position instead of the ejected position. That's a ridiculous process isn't it...

[@12voltvids]

@@crashbandicoot4everr yes it is. And you have to do this to change the loading belt. I used to hate to see these machines come in. Fortunately by the time a lot of these machines came in people would put limits on how much money they would spend and because their limits were lower than what they would have been charged to take the mechanism apart and replace the belt and time everything a lot of these machines went in the bin. We had a policy that our VCRs we would go ahead up to I think it was $75 on VCRs and would have to call with an estimate if it was more than 75 bucks and these machines always were due to the complexity so nine out of 10 would scrap it and buy a new one so I got out of having to fix a lot of these machines just because they were aging at this point and people were itching to buy a new one anyway.

[@crashbandicoot4everr]

@@12voltvids There is no loading belt in the G mechanism. Everything is driven by the capstan motor and a solenoid that pushes a lever to switch the motor and a clutch from driving the tape spools into driving the loading gears and the front loader. There are two factory training alignment instruction videos here on youtube just because of the complexity of this mechanism.

[@markhod1960]

@@crashbandicoot4everr yep then hope you have it all aligned so your not breaking any gears. god i still hate that mech. Thank god out of that service shit. lol

[@Watcher3223]

Wasn't this VCR the first consumer Super VHS model from JVC?

[@12voltvids]

Couldn't tell you. I had Mitsubishi back then.

[@Watcher3223]

@@12voltvids Well, I guess in the world of video, you were ready to rhombus...

[@crashbandicoot4everr]

It was the second one. The first was the S7000 which looked pretty much identical minus the woodgrain finish.

[@waltchan]

No, the very-first S-VHS made was the 1987 JVC HR-S7000U. This one was slightly more-reliable than 1988 HR-8000U.

[@nathanbishop5614]

can I send you a vcr to get fixed? It has a problem with the Audio that I can't figure out for the life of me even with the service manual.

[@sobolanul96]

I see you are a fan of JMJ. Over the years I saw various footage/heard pieces of his work in your videos.

[@12voltvids]

They used to use oxygen for the opening of the late movie that aired after the 11 o'clock news on bctv. Jack Webster used it also for his theme music on his radio show. Then Jack Webster started using porn music by Alan Tew. You will know it as the theme from the people's court. At one time I had the 3 JMJ vinyl records but loaned them to my brother in-law and when he moved he tossed them out instead of offering them back. I have them on CD. I do have a few of his shows on video i found broadcast on big dish satellite back in the day.

[@walle637]

why is it that a vcr like this has so many bloody boards and yet you can find a vcr from like 2007 with one board for everything?

[@12voltvids]

Large scale integration thats why. They put everything into a couple of chips. They made them much simpler and much more reliable. I would take a late model VCR any day over one from early 80s. Yes they are more "flimsy" as some put it but if you load them gently they generally are pretty reliable and with the reduced part count,both electrical and mechanical there are far fewer points of failure. They are no more repairable though as no parts are available regardless of the vintage. Plus advancement in signal processing with the advent of DSP means that a newer vintage machine produces a better picture then the older models could ever be expected to produce.

[@crashbandicoot4everr]

Back in the days of early VCRs each function required a unique IC. There were different ICs for the syscon, servo, motor drive, luma, chroma circuits etc. In the late days they integrated everything into a single "Jungle chip".

[@tamerrafie9965]

What to do if a Sony HiFi keeps forget clock time and radio station presets Everytime I unplug it from the electricity? My Sony HiFi is VX90AV. Thanks in advance.

[@stevenclarke5606]

It should have a button type battery which supplies back up power for the clock and station memory. You could replace it yourself or take it to a tech guy, it should be an inexpensive fix.

[@tamerrafie9965]

@@stevenclarke5606 thank you Steven for reply . I did opened the HiFi and locked for such a battery long time ago but found nothing and also I have a couple more HiFi in other rooms Sony W55 and Sony G88 . Only Sony W55 can remember the radio station presets but the other 2 forget everything once unplugged. No batteries inside and I check the service manual and no clue about batteries , I live with this problem since long time and this is why I asked you here . I follow your channel because I like cassette tapes specially the Professional ones . Thanks again .

[@12voltvids]

Battery is quite often on display board and you need to remove to access. Some use a super capacitor. Look for a 1F cap rated at about 5.5volts

[@tamerrafie9965]

@@12voltvids great Idea . I will do it and let you know asap. Thank you very much .

[@VSigma725]

I almost bought one of these off eBay a bit ago, I'm glad I didn't!

[@12voltvids]

My advide is to stay away from all this old shat

[@waltchan]

@@12voltvids What about Mitsubishi HS-U80? Would you rate it reliable?

[@MichaelMichael-kv4gp]

I have a JVC HRS8000 and remote! It played a Goofy Movie just fine but then ate my lord of the rings. It needs a full cleaning. I've never worked on anything before and watching this.... Not sure if I will lol. Very complicated for my first VHS player, I think I'll hire someone :)

[@rs2klee]

head cleaning is kinda good to watch, as i think we like to see how bad they can really get :)

[@12voltvids]

I spent too much time cursing at this one. When you start cursing the engineers that made a product for the nightmare they created.

[@instantwow]

I have an HR-S100000u that is similarly constructed. One of the hi-fi channels is bad and I think the problem is on the hi-fi daughter board’s surface mount capacitors. It’s really hard to get to it with all spaghetti wires so I’ve been avoiding it... These are neat looking machines cosmetically, but a terror to service. Dave, I’ve had great luck finding service manual scans at servicemanuals.net. Even for the schematics they are at a high resolution. When I’ve found an issue with a schematic, they can quickly rescan it. Most manuals are around $20, but if it is something you really care about it is worth it.

[@12voltvids]

I don't care about anything that much and for 20 bucks i want a paper manual in my hand not something i have to print our using my paper and toner.

[@janchristensen9858]

Maybe you should test it with VHS casset in VHS mode and not S-VHS mode... Maybe its get green in VHS mode only.

[@12voltvids]

I tested with both. Svhs uses additional circuitry. I also tested both composite and s video outputs.

[@veb92168]

Wow super complicated

[@mangeshnawathe3668]

I want to suggest that, you try using forceps for delicate work like changing belts or remove cut washers etc. It helps a lot.

[@weerobot]

Rats Nest is Right...lol

[@waltchan]

Well, if you don't think this 1988 JVC S-VHS was that reliable for this era with its best mechanism, then Toshiba S-VHS was definitely the most-reliable in the late-1980s. All of the JVC S-VHS models went downhill after HR-S8000U. The successor 1989 HR-S6600U is an interesting story to discuss for its crap quality.

[@videofun4651]

I'd be interesting in hearing that story. I have every consumer JVC SVHS mech from 1987 - 2005. I've found the mechanism the JVC HR S6600U uses has issues with the Hi Fi audio board having issues not playing Hi Fi, so I assume it needs to be recapped.

[@NunYa953]

HATE HATE HATE These JVC machines! Did I mention I hate them? Buy a Sony or Mitsubishi S-VHS machine. You'll thank me later.

[@12voltvids]

Yes they are shit.

[@NunYa953]

@@12voltvids I have one that won't rewind unless the tape is in play mode. It starts and then stops after about 2 seconds. Cleaned mode switch, timing is good. Is it a bad idler tire?

[@12voltvids]

@@NunYa953 Likely yes