PIONEER RT 909 FULL

Work performed includes cleaning and degreasing of drive mechanisms, replacement of capstan belt, replacement of pinch roller idler tires, cleaning and degreasing of transport, replacement of drive bearings, head. I manufactured black head bases and also silver ones. Pioneer RT-909 Reel to Reel tape recorder. And sure they used 100% the same font as present on the original one. However the lettering is of far better quality as the original is. The guys in this factory are very high skilled in such jobs (not easy for everyone: 7mm thick aluminium!!) The rebuild is exactly like the original or better. I manufactured this in the company where Burmester (very known high-end brand in Europe) also produce front panels and cases. The only solution was the exact rebuild from the original. Shine and brushing degree is stretched over a wide range.įor my RT-909 black project I had no possibility to reanodize the original head-base to get a good surface. It is visible that the head-base (regardless which one of the both models), had very inconsistent finish and they looks from deck to deck different. The head-base is one of the very strange parts in the RT-909. The maximum possible with this plate was a tone of dark-grey but far from full-black. Because of the poor aluminium alloy this can't be reanodized to black. This don't have any bubbles and flaking problems over the time, but I had no chance to reuse it in my RT-909 Black project. But is a kind of alloy with poor aluminium consistency.

PIONEER RT 909 FULL

The other head-base model used by Pioneer is brighter and is of full aluminium. But for long term stability it should be nickel over copper and then chromium over nickel, otherwise over the time, copper and chromium interacts each other building such bubbles and is finally flaking off. Same problem occurs also with the reel-tables, having similar coating and build these bubbles after many years.Īs I understood from several coating specialized companies, the problem appears because the chromium coating was applied directly over a layer of copper. Now after 25 years, this coating is coming off.

That's for sure the reason why Pioneer don't anodized it, but coated it with something looking like aluminium (is a chromium coating over copper). Is a kind of die cast and this material can’t be anodized. The one is darker and today start to build bubbles and the coating is flaking off. My biggest project over more than 3 years was to re-build the RT-909 black.ĭuring the modification process from silver to black, I remarked that Pioneer released two different models of the head-base plate.

Pioneer rt 909