Kenwood KX-550 Cassette Deck - A quick journey to repair a faulty PAUSE switch

Hang out with me for a bit as I repair a faulty pause switch on my Kenwood KX-550 cassette deck. This issue manifested after about a year of use after delving deep into the mechanism to replace the main drive belt. My guess is that I had not assembled it correctly, and only now did the alignment of that plastic solenoid extension cause the issue by getting in the way of the pause switch mechanism.

[@chickenfoundation9323]

Did you replace the belts? If so where did you get them from?

[@pubsub9832]

www.vintage-electronics.net/kenwood-kx-550-belt-kit.aspx

[@markotis5053]

Nicely done!, I have the KX-1030 and the Play, FF, RR, Record buttons don't stay latched. they latch for about 2 second and then pop up, Any clue why this is happening? Thanks

[@pubsub9832]

Is the tape counter working? If the counter is not spinning then most decks will stop all actions.

[@markotis5053]

Hi Thanks for the reply, Yes the tape counter is working, ironically, the pause button is working fine... @@pubsub9832

[@GerardHousieaux]

Hello, You said you replaced the main drive belt, this is great !. Did you put a video on line ? I have KX-530 cassette deck (In France) and the belt is out. I got a new one , but I did not find any tuto for help. It seems not easy to do it. Based on your vidée it seems the cassette mechanical is the same on both models. Thanks

[@nicholascarpenter4814]

Hey, how did you remove the Record knob? I can't figure out how to remove it to take the front panel off. The issue I am having isn't to do with the pause switch, is it that the tape playing mechanism is not moving at all when you press play or try to rewind/fast-forward. The tape deck turns on and everything.

[@pubsub9832]

Hey. There will be a hole on the larger knob. There is a hex head set screw deep in that hole that holds on the knob. You should need a 1mm hex key to reach down into the hole and loosen that set screw. Then both the larger and smaller knobs will come off the front.

[@sergeyzazovski8060]

@@pubsub9832, 1.5mm hex key, thanks you for the info 🙏🏻

[@pankajmakwana336]

Pankaj 🇮🇳😢😮😅😊