Nakamichi Dragon Tape Deck, Minty And Serviced

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Working Dragons are becoming more and more difficult to find.

While legendary for the performance, they age over time and will eventually need service.

Servicing a tape deck of this complexity is particularly difficult, truly a labor of love. Just getting the mechanism out is a long endeavor!

We're lucky to have a stash of some original Nakamichi spare parts, enough to do a handful of decks over the past year. (Sorry we don't sell parts or offer repairs, click here if that's what you need).

This particular unit received just that - a full service and test.

We replaced all the consumable components in need.

The unit was cleaned, lubricated, demagnetized, calibrated, and fully tested for performance.

Condition is very good with very slight signs of use.

Recommended Cables:

Kimber Kable - RCA Interconnects - Better

Kimber Kable - RCA Interconnects - Best

The SkyFi Testing Process for Tape Decks and Reel to Reel Machines:

First steps are performed to determine if the unit is a candidate for our full restoration process or if its just in need of a light service.

We first do a  basic functionality test to ensure proper playback fast forward and rewind.  We look for smooth operation of the motors, transport engagement and associated rolling parts.  

We then do an internal physical inspection to ensure the belts and rubber consumable parts are up to spec.  

Internal components are checked to make sure that there are no signs of heat stress or damage particularly in the power supply section.  Capacitors are checked for telltale signs of predictive failure including bulging, shrunken wrappers, or physical leakage. We also inspect the PCBs for discoloration from resistors or transistors that may have been running hot. On vintage units we often spot check select capacitors for value and ESR. 

A light service will involve replacement of belts and rollers, external cleaning of heads, mechanism and boards and basic record and playback tests.  

A full restoration will often include disassembly of the drive system and replacement of all consumable and wearable parts including pinch rollers, belts, brakes, bearings.  We then clean lubricate and re-assembly the drive and perform basic mechanical alignment to ensure proper tape path and head alignment. 

Final calibration will involved adjustment of playback erase and record heads and optimization of the bias for a specific tape type.  We do this with the aid of a  Soundtech 1510A tape deck analyzer and a Nakamichi T100 unit and reference calibration tapes.  

Final listening tests are done while monitoring with our reference Grado HP1 headphones and a variety of factory and custom reference recordings.  We find that there is no better system for critical listening on tapes than the headphones specially when comparing a live feed to a recorded feed.