Help troubleshoot a tape-eating video cassette recorder (VCR)

[electra225]

I bought a Magnavox VCR/DVD player at an auction for probably not much money. Nothing worked when I got it home. It would "power up" (whatever that means), the "On" light would come on, but that was about it. I found one of the buttons on the DVD player didn't contact the "play" switch. Tweaking fixed that, so now the DVD works. I put one of my favorite tapes in the VCR. It played well, stopped well, everything like that was good. But it ate my tape! I had to take the top off and the front panel off to get my tape back. The eject belt is still there and the motor runs. It gets about halfway out, then just stops. It sets the tape back down, plays it again until you hit eject. Then it does this all over again. Can the belt just be slipping badly enough it won't kick the tape out?

[Conelrad]

Look for something sticky in the tape path. It usually comes from the tape itself, where the leader is glued to the tape.

D

[hermitcrab]

sounds like the mode switch ... that little control that needs to be cleaned on the circuit board .... norcal715 on YT has done many videos as to how to clean it to restore proper operation...

[electra225]

Thank you both. I will check out those videos and see if I can figure out what's going on.