The Tascam 388

plasticapples · Post by **plasticapples** » Sun Feb 07, 2016 3:31 pm

I've had my 388 for a few years now, bought it from someone who said he had probably only put 20 hours on the machine. Throughout the time I've had it, I have done a few project for bands I've been in, and I don't believe I've put too many hours into the machine.

Ive never had problems recording, until yesterday. The first channel recorded fine and sounds fine panned either way, but when I recorded the second track, during playback as I panned hard right, the volume dropped to the point when there was just fuzzy distortion during louder parts of the song. When I pan hard left, the volume raises again and sounds normal. I know that I'd panned them correctly during recording, so i'm wondering whats up. Ive heard that the pan pot could need cleaning, and if so, how do I go about that? I'm also concerned about the possibility of the heads opening up so I took some pictures to see what condition they were in and/or if they need to be relapped.

http://tinypic.com/r/6qw2vt/9
http://tinypic.com/r/2ekkrw1/9
http://tinypic.com/r/vowgnd/9

kslight · Post by **kslight** » Sun Feb 07, 2016 6:08 pm

Flip the 388 over and remove the screws on the bottom panel and pull the panel off to get to the insides. Google potentiometer cleaning for appropriate application. Super easy. That does sound like it could be your problem.

As to the heads it's hard to tell since the pics have a lot of glare and are at indirect angles. As long as you keep it clean all the time and the previous owner really only put 20 hours on its probably fine. You can send photos to jrf magnetics if you're in doubt though.

mjt335 · Post by **mjt335** » Mon Feb 08, 2016 8:51 am

plasticapples wrote:Ive never had problems recording, until yesterday. The first channel recorded fine and sounds fine panned either way, but when I recorded the second track, during playback as I panned hard right, the volume dropped to the point when there was just fuzzy distortion during louder parts of the song. When I pan hard left, the volume raises again and sounds normal. I know that I'd panned them correctly during recording, so i'm wondering whats up. Ive heard that the pan pot could need cleaning, and if so, how do I go about that? I'm also concerned about the possibility of the heads opening up so I took some pictures to see what condition they were in and/or if they need to be relapped.

Please keep me posted if you figure something out with this. Mine does the same thing but I haven't had the time (or confidence) to open it up yet... I've just been panning accordingly on the channels that are malfunctioning! haha

plasticapples · Post by **plasticapples** » Thu Feb 11, 2016 5:23 pm

mjt335 wrote:Please keep me posted if you figure something out with this. Mine does the same thing but I haven't had the time (or confidence) to open it up yet... I've just been panning accordingly on the channels that are malfunctioning! haha

Opening it up and spraying the pots with chemical cleaner seemed to do it actually. There was hardly any dust inside the machine, just a few spider webs. It had also been making static noise when I would press the channel switches above the pan control so I sprayed those down too. Its pretty easy to find everything inside... I was surprised at all the circuit boards inside. Theres a lot of them. Kind of like opening a PC.

dlmorley · Post by **dlmorley** » Sat Feb 13, 2016 12:09 am

Hi all. I'm going to be looking at a 388 today or tomorrow, so was wondering if there are any things that I should look out for when checking it over. Any simple way of telling head condition and any other parts that are critical?
Thanks in advance!
David.

kslight · Post by **kslight** » Sat Feb 13, 2016 6:12 am

Play/stop/ff/rw

All mic ins and rmx ins

VU lights and meters

Clean up the heads and shine a light if you need to. Obviously you don't want rust or a big head gap, scratches/gouges...

dlmorley · Post by **dlmorley** » Sat Feb 13, 2016 8:40 am

Thanks...well I needn't have worried. It's basically nr mint with the original manual. The seller was an older guy who said he got it in around 1990 and used it once a year or so for projects. I love the stereo links for the faders too

I always wanted a Studio 8 and am glad I waited for a good one to turn up. Huge bag of tapes too with quite a few unused, BUT I have no idea what they are as they don't match the boxes..so I'll still probably get some fresh stiff at some point.

Happy days..

[/img]

IMG_1751 by David Morley, on Flickr

kslight · Post by **kslight** » Sat Feb 13, 2016 9:36 am

Wow I've bought (3) 388s and I've never seen the stereo link for the faders, pretty cool. I bet I could 3D print that, though not real necessary because I don't mix on the 388, just track.

One of mine came from a church that only used it once or twice for theatre then sat forever. Was very nice that one is in my friend's studio (basically unused by him since he's on the road 9 months out of the year), but I've been keeping an older one going for my main, and I have a spare one in the laundry room?

Looks great. While I use the hell out of old tape that I got with mine because I'm cheap and its personal projects so I don't really care, I recently put on a reel of RMGI LPR35 (aka the 'new stuff') and I immediately noticed an improvement in fidelity.

IMHO worth buying a few new reels when you have some extra cash.

Be sure to pick up some cleaning supplies and a han-d-mag if you don't already have one. Take good care of it and it'll take care of you. Tascam still sells capstan belts and maybe other parts as well.

dlmorley · Post by **dlmorley** » Sat Feb 13, 2016 10:15 am

Thanks for the tips. Yes, I need to get a demagnifier and stuff.
Do people use alignment tapes on the 388? If so, can they be found?
Cheers

kslight wrote:Wow I've bought (3) 388s and I've never seen the stereo link for the faders, pretty cool. I bet I could 3D print that, though not real necessary because I don't mix on the 388, just track.

One of mine came from a church that only used it once or twice for theatre then sat forever. Was very nice that one is in my friend's studio (basically unused by him since he's on the road 9 months out of the year), but I've been keeping an older one going for my main, and I have a spare one in the laundry room?

Looks great. While I use the hell out of old tape that I got with mine because I'm cheap and its personal projects so I don't really care, I recently put on a reel of RMGI LPR35 (aka the 'new stuff') and I immediately noticed an improvement in fidelity.

IMHO worth buying a few new reels when you have some extra cash.

Be sure to pick up some cleaning supplies and a han-d-mag if you don't already have one. Take good care of it and it'll take care of you. Tascam still sells capstan belts and maybe other parts as well.

kslight · Post by **kslight** » Sat Feb 13, 2016 12:29 pm

I think so, but I think one of the alignment tapes was only available through Tascam and can occasionally be found on eBay, but not new anywhere. You can still get a playback alignment tape through MRL though, don't remember the respective part numbers off hand. I could spend the same money on the correct alignment tapes and tenselometer and such as I did on each machine...

I personally have not done any alignment on my machines, though I recognize they could use some pro servicing..I have done minor work though as needed...I enjoy these machines for their imperfections and I do not know any good tape techs where I live so I am happy with them as is. Some day I will probably do them right, just not today.

dlmorley · Post by **dlmorley** » Sun Feb 14, 2016 12:08 am

As it is, it sounds perfect with one of the blank tapes I have, so I'll leave as is for a while! I'm actually surprised how nice. So far I prefer with dbx on and levels under 0VU. A mix I put on 2 tracks sounds great and no real lack of treble or anything negative.
One thing I STILL can't work out is the monitoring of armed tracks.
If I assign inputs 1 and 2 to say buss 5 and 6, how can I use the the PGM monitoring? I have the monitor gains up and no matter if the second switch is in PGM or Cue etc, I get nothing. If I take a connection out of the PGM outputs, it is there on busses 5 and 6...and the meters for 5 and 6 move fine..just the monitoring section is silent.
Thanks!

mjt335 · Post by **mjt335** » Mon Apr 11, 2016 9:25 am

plasticapples wrote:Opening it up and spraying the pots with chemical cleaner seemed to do it actually. There was hardly any dust inside the machine, just a few spider webs. It had also been making static noise when I would press the channel switches above the pan control so I sprayed those down too. Its pretty easy to find everything inside... I was surprised at all the circuit boards inside. Theres a lot of them. Kind of like opening a PC.

I finally got around to this as well. It seems to have worked for me too. The pan pots were pretty tough to get to from the back, so I pulled the knob/nut/washer off the front and hit them there as well.

Colorblind · Post by **Colorblind** » Tue Apr 12, 2016 10:37 am

mjt335 wrote:
plasticapples wrote:Opening it up and spraying the pots with chemical cleaner seemed to do it actually. There was hardly any dust inside the machine, just a few spider webs. It had also been making static noise when I would press the channel switches above the pan control so I sprayed those down too. Its pretty easy to find everything inside... I was surprised at all the circuit boards inside. Theres a lot of them. Kind of like opening a PC.
I finally got around to this as well. It seems to have worked for me too. The pan pots were pretty tough to get to from the back, so I pulled the knob/nut/washer off the front and hit them there as well.

What kind of chemical cleaner are you guys using for this? I've had the same issue with my 388.

mjt335 · Post by **mjt335** » Tue Apr 12, 2016 11:03 am

I used DeoxIT contact cleaner.

Colorblind · Post by **Colorblind** » Thu Apr 14, 2016 7:27 am

mjt335 wrote:I used DeoxIT contact cleaner.

Thanks!

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