Who wants to give me advice on Space Echo Maintenance?

[touched1]

I have a Roland Space Echo (real one, not reissue) RE-201 that I've had for about 15 years. It's always worked like a champ. But since the last servicing, I've noticed a significant dropout when the splice rolls around. After going round and round with the repair shop about some other issues, I opted to order a tape from another source. The new tape yielded the same results.

So from what I've read, I'd guess it's the tension on the arm that guides the tape to the pinch roller. I could be way the hell off. Or I could just be far too critical of my beloved tape delay after taking some time off from it in the last few years.

Also the spring verb sound is very weak. I've been told there is nothing that can be done about this. The lights on the VU are dead also.

I am comfortable taking this thing apart. I have changed and spliced tape and cleaned the pots on the unit myself. I guess I am looking for advice from people who own and maintain their own units. I am tired of giving this to people who don't know how to make it work the way I want it to. So it's best I learn to fix it myself.

I can follow directions. But I am not a bench tech nor can I read schematics.

Is anyone willing to be my tape delay maintenance guru?

[touched1]

Well I seem to have made things worse. I opened up the unit, and patched the rca connection from the spring verb to an external pre, boosted the gain, and ran it back to the unit. A good workaround I thought. I seemed to work OK for a bit....

At some point after doing this, I lost the erase/record function of the tape heads. The tape will play what was fed to it before the heads stopped functioning. But it will no longer generate new echo nor self oscillate when the intensity is cranked. No delay at all. The unit will still pass signal from an instrument from the input to the output. The sound on tape that is playing has a "sizzled" quality to it.

I thought I might have knocked loose a solder joint, as I was tucking the additional patch cables inside the unit. But I don't see any loose wires inside. I have found what appear to be 2 compromised resistors. At least the 2 resistors are discolored in a slightly scorched way, where no other resistors are. I can see the resistor #'s in the service manual, but that does not help me much, as most of the manual is Greek to me..

So does it make sense that I potentially overloaded a few resistors by patching a preamp with MUCH higher gain than the spring tank itself?

It is at this point I loudly and publicly acknowledge that I'd prefer to take this in for service. But a strict budget means DIY or close it up and put it on the shelf and leave it alone. And I am crazy about the sound of this unit and having a hard time doing that. I have a friend who is great with electronics and may be able to help. But he is not an audio tech. So when it comes to finer adjustments (adjusting bias etc...) I am not sure we could do that. Perhaps I should just take it into the shop and let them know it will be a bit before I can pay. If it stays here, I am just going to keep effing with it and making things worse.

I am not sure if I am looking for advice or empathy. I think I am just working through the fact that I just crippled one of my favorite units and there is not a lot I can do about it.

[themagicmanmdt]

spring reverb units have an input and output impedance, and it's very likely that the line output impedance of the external preamp you 'drove' the echo with may have caused some internal stress, regardless of the sound level of the reverb you sent to the space echo from the preamp.

then again, i'm not sure, since i'm not comfortable with how it looks and operates.

why didn't you just find a replacement reverb tank with the same specs and swap it out?

anyways.

try replacing the fried resistors. that hasn't worked for me in the past - usually that means one of the opamps/transistors to overloaded or funkified in a way, and that's beyond my experience to test out.

does your old reverb sound and hookup work fine?

is it just the tape echo that's not working now?

[touched1]

Thanks for the reply themagicmanmdt, and that's a beautiful space you have there in Chicago!

The reverb works, it's output is just very weak, it worked better years ago.

I did not try to find a replacement for a number of reasons, primarily cost and availability. It's been in 2 different shops and I've asked for it to be fixed both times, and they sort of let it go, implying that it was more trouble than it was worth to try and fix it.
I was just happy to have my tape delay back. So I let it go too.

The verb was working OK with the preamp patched in. I did not test it thoroughly, but it was MUCH louder than before without appearing to overload.

I am taking it to a friend with some experience doing service on Space Echos. So I am going to leave it alone from here on out.

I'll post back once the verdict is in.

[themagicmanmdt]

thanks! good luck - i'm curious to know what happened -