CED VideoDisc and Player Discussion

lynx · Joined: 30 Jun 2018 Posts: 100

One month ago, I wrote on here about my CED player having a problem with its servo motor. This weekend, I finally took the top cabinet off of my player to watch it work while it plays a videodisc. It turns out that the problem does not seem to be with the servo motor, but a bad servo belt.

The new servo belt that I installed was a belt that I bought from Kevin Santry at Mister Edison. For some reason, the belt has deteriorated, and the gears near the motor chewed up the belt. There are black pieces of the belt on the chassis underneath the servo which have flaked off, and it has crumbled. I was very surprised!

Here is my question:

Would it be a good idea to order a free servo belt from Tom Howe thru a self-addressed stamped envelope & install it in my RCA SFT 100 W, or should I try a different belt? He wrote that the belts that he gives away may not fit in the player, and that they need to be stretched, which required some experimentation with how to do it.

On a side note, last night, I ordered a bottle of Phil Wood Tenacious Oil to use for lubricating my turntable, which is recommended on this web site.

Thanks again for the help!

jsdspif · Joined: 16 Jan 2016 Posts: 278

I don't quite understand that belt issue? Did you thouroughly clean and let dry all the surfaces the belt touches? I can't imagine that happening with a newer/new belt. (as in even a 10 year old belt). It seems like I bought a belt from cedatum that was actually only half as wide as the original,this allowed it to work without stretching and it came with a small plastic "bead" that you pushed on to the motor shaft to keep the belt in it's proper location. Or I may have just seen a photo of it,can't remember.
With the oil I started to wonder about it's viscocity/thickness. When doing the "flip the player upside down and oil it and wait a day for oil to run into bearing areas..." method,if it is quite thick I would think it may not flow into the areas where it needs to be. Of course,if you are removing the truntable it would probably work just like it's supposed to but for the upside down method I guess put some on there,look at it to see how much is there and the next day there should be less (if any) left on there if it has ran down the shaft. It's a pretty tight fit between the shaft and it's "bearings" but I think you'd know if it's run down or not.
As for the belt .I'm stumped.

lynx · Joined: 30 Jun 2018 Posts: 100

jsdspif · Joined: 16 Jan 2016 Posts: 278

I thought Tom pre-stretches his? Not sure though.
The problem with removing the turntable is the 2 small philips head screws that have to be removed. They often do not want to come loose and the heads strip out and/or (at least this happened to me) you have to put so much pressure on the screw it pushes the turntable further down the turntable shaft. I think oiling upside down would be just fine as long as you verify oil is running down the turntable shaft. You'd just put some oil at the shaft,see the 5 drops or whatever are there ,look the next day and the oil should no longer be what you originally put on there. It only has about a 1/4 inch to run thru that first "bearing" (it's really just a bronze or some similar material "sleeve") then it would continue to flow down the shaft about 2 inches or so to the other "bearing" (just another 1/4" sleeve) and flow into that. That material is somewhat porous and originally I'm thinking it was oil-impregnated to be self lubricating with out collecting dust/debris but it has "dried up" over the years.
The turntable belts are pretty robust and last I was told in short supply. I don't think CEDatum even sell them anymore. I bought a couple different length flat turtable belts that appeared to be the same size but have yet to try them. I replaced the belts on 2 players but I don't think I had to. One was my own player and another I'm going to sell and I just wanted to say "replaced all the belts".

52089 · Joined: 08 Jul 2018 Posts: 19

Hi - it's Kevin here. I'm sorry to hear you are having issues with the belts. Drop me a note, cedbelts2@mredison.com, so I can send you new ones. I've heard of them stretching out or breaking over time, but not deteriorating.

Tom will send you a belt, but it's a generic one that tends to bind. John Stevens at CEDatum uses a narrow belt as described in another post, but CEDatum also recommends my belts.

The turntable lubrication servicing is not critical unless you are having speed issues.

Again, please contact me so I can get you fresh belts.