Can anyone help me?

I have just acquired a Beomaster 2000 that has had a rough time. The manual tuning is jammed and I would like to free it. One end wooden trim has come loose and so far I have removed the base cover and the screws fixing the works to the wooden frame. It appears as if the main boards should hinge up from the base at the rear.  I have the service manual but can not follow the exploded diagram to see how it should be done nor can I see any obvious hinges. 

    Some of the units and trim are loose and this may be intended or due to distortion and perhaps broken fixing lugs so I don't want to cause any more damage by forcing things. Can anyone tell me how to open the works?  On some other units I have, there has been a little drawing on the base that makes it obvious but I can find nothing here.

Many thanks in advance

John

First of all you'll need to tell us which Beomaster 2000 you have

If it is the '70s "ironing board", the top of the unit flips up not unlike the Beocenter 9500 series, only that the hinges are in the rear edge. The circuit boards themselves won't move anywhere with any reasonable amount of work!

Thanks Mika.

I persevered assuming the hinges were at the rear as you said. There were some slight distortions and loose woodwork but as you reassured me what should happen, I have now got it standing upright and can sort out the loose bits. The tuning capacitor is very stiff and I can also get at it to ease the stiffness.

Many Thanks indeed.

John

Good! This is a great sounding receiver and well worth restoring. Getting the case parts aligned properly can get annoying when putting the receiver back together. I've fixed two of these and never got the hang of it, always takes several tries before the buttons sit centered in their slot...

If the FM presets are stuck, they can be fixed. Let us know if you need more advice.

Mika, It is going well at the moment and am steadily getting the bits back. The tuning capacitor is freeing but I think I will have to re string or at least shorten the string  as the drive slips.

I have had sound from the FM using the pre-sets and agree it is very impressive. Two of the presets are stuck, I had intended to ignore these but if they can be freed I think I will do this before reassembly. 

Many thanks

John

You'll need to remove the preset trimmers from the PCB they are installed on (I seem to remember you have to desolder all wires coming to the PCB, make notes before doing that!). Then, very carefully pull the plastic thumbwheel off the metal axle. Spray a little contact cleaner or isopropanol on the axle and inside the trimmer, then carefully work the axle with pliers. It should come loose and start working nicely after you've turned it end to end several times.

Finish off with a tiny amount of lubricant on the axle (I think I used white lithium grease - don't get that on the actual carbon track inside the trimmer) and it's a good idea to lubricate the still working trimmers as well. Push the thumbwheels back in place and they should still have enough grip to turn the preset with no problems. If not, epoxy might be the answer. I had to free 9 of my 10 presets and all ended up working fine!

Do all your dial & marker lights work? It's a silly circuit and needs the exact right bulb values to work properly. I believe Dillen can supply these if need be.

Re: the sticky dial, you'll probably also need to clean and lubricate the metal rod that the dial pointer rides on.

I have found the dial rod seems a bit rusty so I think metal polish and lubricant is needed.

None of the dial lights work so I will have to look for something common. I will check them but as none work it may be a simple broken wire. The pcb with the tuning and stereo indicator was loose which makes me suspicious. The presets seem as if they are going to pass the time for a while so I might leave them till the set is working and think aabout them again.

John

The indicator light circuit was probably designed by someone after way too many Carlsbergs... if the moving dial bulb is out, "on" and "stereo" won't work either as it supplies power to the others. The tuning balance circuit has its own quirks. Anyway most of the bulbs were out on mine, seems like a failure prone type or maybe they are just driven a bit hard on these Beomasters.

I took the easiest first and fixed the pre-sets.  When I unclipped the assembly I ffound I could remove them from the pcb one at a time and this made remembering the wiring easy. Your description how to free the slider worked fine. I have removed the dial cord as it was slack so the tuning and stereo lamps are easily accessible. The coloured plastic "lens"parts had come loose so I will have to refit them. They don't appear to be secured in any way so is there a trick of fixing them to the bulb housings so that the whole assembly can be refitted? It looks as if the whole light unit had been designed during a Wednesday Forum. Perhaps that is the best time to work on it!

John

John:

It looks as if the whole light unit had been designed during a Wednesday Forum. Perhaps that is the best time to work on it!

If you mean the coloured plastic windows that show through the front panel, they are supposed to be fixed on the front panel, not the bulbs. I guess they were originally glued, same thing with the clear "rails" on the tuning dial. I think I used contact cement to fix mine (don't get it on the visible part). The dial windows were all cloudy so I removed them and cleaned them as well before glueing them back on.

The volume etc. sliders can also be disassembled and cleaned if they are dirty underneath, and they probably are. It's been a while, but I seem to remember that there was a danger of breaking them in the process, so proceed with care if you decide to do that...

Yes that is what I meant. It makes sense but there was no sign of glue. I will cement them in place. Fortunately the tuning scales look fine so I can leave them alone. Thanks for your warning about the sliders they did not seem to be noisy so I will not risk anything. I suspect aligning the potentiometers with the panel sliders might be enough of a problem.

The instruction on re stringing seems very detailed so I should be able to do that.  It seemed almost self evident when I took the cord off but I have had too much experience of dial cords to be complacent.

Many thanks for all your help

John

John:

Thanks for your warning about the sliders they did not seem to be noisy so I will not risk anything. I suspect aligning the potentiometers with the panel sliders might be enough of a problem.

I was referring to cleaning the panel sliders, not the pots themselves. Aligning is easier than it seems - just drive all sliders and pots to (say) left end, and they will go into place when you lower the top on them.

The dial cord is not one of the worst but can take several tries to get working properly. When reassembling, note the cabling that goes to the moving dial light. It has a spring thing inside it, and it is supposed to keep it against the front panel even after you've swung it down. Otherwise the dial will stop mid-travel when the cable binds with the higher components below. Drove me nuts until I figured this out!

Thanks Mika,

I might just give the pots some cleaner while it is open. I keep finding problems as I go on. The tuning and stereo indicator PCB and lamp holders were adrift when I looked inside so I dont know how they were originally secured. The coloured glass is not a problem now and I have glued them to the panel burt I still have a couple of puzzles with the lamp units.

The tuning lamp holder has a screw holding the white plastic to the PCB but the other one has nothing except for being held in place by the bulbs. The bigger puzzle is how to fit the whole unit. I can see two springy plastic fingers that look as if they should wedge the unit between the top and bottom rails of the panel but they are only at one end. I suspect that there should be two at the other end also so that the whole lot is a push fit but these have broken off. Am I missing something or will I have to resort to double sided tape on one end? 

I keep finding these oddities,  B&O are so meticulous in their design that I can never be sure with vintage equipment whether something is broken and missing or I have overlooked the obvious when something does not fit.

I really appreciate your experience,

John

No problem John, sharing whatever I've learned is half the fun

Unfortunately I really can't remember the mechanical details of that light panel too well. Unless anybody else has some input on that, I'll open my spare receiver and take a look later (it's just standing in a closet pending more work anyway).

Mika ,

I just had a careful look at the panel and I am now certain that there should be two fingers on the other end also I think I will be able to fabricate a channel out of resin and filler to bond to the pcb. this will hook under the channel on the top frame and the remaining fingers will act as retaining clips at the bottom. It hope this will secure it. Not as elegant as a B&O fabrication but it will be out of sight . I will let you know if it works.

John

Just to wind up the thread,  I have put all back together and it sounds excellent. Also the advice I had on the light sub-unit from Dillen worked fine and it all fits quite well.

Thanks to everyone

John

Excellent work

This is one of my favourite Beomasters, great looks (albeit a bit of space consuming...) and great performance in the same package. There wasn't much talk on these when I got mine, but it seems to have gotten a following in the recent times! Here's an old arrival picture of mine in case somebody is still wondering what we are talking about

Well done, John. Very interesting to read about your restoration project. I have a BM 2000 with no lights -so now I know what to do

And @tournedos: Very nice BM 2000 on the picture. Mine is white (also very nice) -but after I saw yours, I have to look for another one in wood/black trim like yours.

Damn -this hobby is getting too expensive

Hello Steffen, Thank you for your kind comment. The lights were quite straight forward with Dillen's kit and instructions. The most tricky part I found was the light on the cursor. It seemed as if the end of the flexible wire was used as a fixing solder tag. 

I must admit I find that these older B&O units are a bit more elegant than the current models. It is a shame that they have moved away from separate units but I must accept that the fully integrated systems have their own attractions, especially for convenience.