Beogram 3000 (5228): Restoration of the Plexiglass Hood - Repair of a Cracked Hinge and Installation of 3D Printed Mounting Brackets

A while ago I received a Beogram 3000 with a deteriorated plexiglass hood. The plastic mounting brackets of the hood were broken out

and one of the plexiglass hinges was broken off:

I developed a repair kit containing 3D printed mounting brackets, a special tool for re-inserting the spring tensioning block, and laser cut plexiglass patches for rejoining the hinge:

The video below shows how to use the parts. Like all other Beolover parts, this repair kit is available to other enthusiasts. Just send me an email or use the contact form on the right. Enjoy the video!

Beogram 8002: Glueing on the Aluminum Panels, Installing the Hood and a Test Drive with Chico Hamilton on Impulse!

Time to put this Beogram 8002 back together! It came a bit as a kit with the hood removed and the aluminum panels detached. As usual I glued the panel around the platter on with epoxy using 4-40 washers to bridge the gap between the plastic shell and the panel:

After the epoxy had hardened it was time to glue on the panel:

After this it was time to put the hood back on. It simply clips into place around the back part of the plastic shell of the enclosure. The only sweat producing part is to get the leaf spring inserted the correct way while attaching the hood. This shows how the spring is to be inserted:

since I only have two hands, I fixed the spring in place with some Scotch tape:

This helps a lot since the assembly is upright during this attachment operation. Once the hood assembly was in place it was time to attache the smaller aluminum panel.

As usual, I attached it with three layers of double sided tape. That shimmed it up to the level achieved with the 1980s style foam adhesive tape B&O used back then to attach these panels to the plastic parts.

After all this it was time to give this 8002 a spin. I selected a recently acquired original pressing of Chick Hamilton's gorgeous "Passin' Through" album (Impulse A-29).

The second side is an amazing, almost psychedelic experience that would probably convert the most ardent digital music purist that vinyl is the way to go! Such a direct, warm and vibrant experience! Absolutely amazing! I wish I could find a time machine and go see a Hamilton performance live in the 60s!

Beogram 8000: Re-Attaching the Aluminum Panels

Time for getting pretty! The Beogram 8000 that I am restoring right now is now running nicely. But, like in most of these units, the aluminum panels are detached. Usually, it is no big deal to glue them back on. Here are a few impressions:

The panels were originally attached with some foam based double sided tape. The foam degrades and the panels come off. This is what one typically finds:

A gooey sticky soft mess! Very difficult to remove. I usually put ethanol drenched paper towel wads on there (make sure the veneer is not touched) and then wait for 30 mins:

After that the goo has softened up and can be scraped off with a plastic razor blade. Some residue remains, but this does not matter:

Then I usually glue 4-40 washers to the enclosure as spacers. I use quick setting epoxy:

Then I add some more epoxy on the top of the washers and place the aluminum panel:

Once it is in place, I secure it with carpenter's clamps and a weight for the top right corner, which is not accessible with clamps. This step is crucial, since one essentially only has one shot with epoxy. If you try this at home, make sure that the panel is really in the right spot. Applying the clamps often shifts the panel a bit, i.e. it needs to be kept aligned during the clamping process.

The next step was to put the lid back on. Unfortunately, someone already reattached it once with Gorilla glue and the panel came off again. The glue residue proved very well attached to the plastic hinge and I was not able to remove it.

since the glue residue was flat enough and its thickness similar to 4-40 washers, the situation could be rectified by adding a good amount of epoxy to the residue and more importantly to the regions that were uncoated in between, and placing the lid on top:

Again I secured it with clamps and used a pen to press the hinge upward above the power cord opening. This did the job!

CleanerVinyl: Beolover's Approach to Ultrasonic Vinyl Record Cleaning

While I am pretty happy about my initial approach to vinyl cleaning, ultrasonic cleaning is the superior technology and it is just perfect for vinyl records! Hence, I always longed for an ultrasonic vinyl cleaner, but the currently available dedicated products are all very expensive and out of my reach. It just does not seem to make sense spending $3-4k on an ultrasonic vinyl cleaning device (unless you own a record store...;-). I'd rather spend the money on my rapidly expanding vinyl collection!

So I set out to design a cost effective but elegant solution that would allow me the use of a standard industrial grade ultrasonic bath. Ultrasonic cleaning technology has become a commodity and ebay is flooded with quality units in the $100-200 range that get the job done. The particular unit I selected has a 180W transducer (similar to what the 'competition' uses in their dedicated ultrasonic vinyl cleaners) and the bath size is just enough to hold a record deep enough to get to the final groove.

So, without further ado...(drum roll!!)...I give you the CleanerVinyl ultrasonic vinyl cleaning system:

Beogram 4002 (5513): Repair of a Missing Leaf Spring on a Plate Lock

When I set out to do the sub-chassis, platter and tone arm lowering adjustments on the Beogram 4002 (5513) that I am currently rebuilding I realized that the larger aluminum plate was not seating properly with the plinth pushed back. If that happens it is impossible to properly adjust the platter to be flush with the plate.

The plate was wiggling up and down in the back left corner where one of the locks that are supposed to pull the plate down onto the frame when the plinth is moved back did not do its job. The locks accomplish the pull-down with a leaf spring that is attached to the bottom of the lock plate. This shows the right-back lock that still has the leaf spring attached.

I thought a bit about how to fix this, and I know that many Beograms either never had the springs or they fell off at some point and were discarded. In these cases often a tech bent the lock plate to act as a makeshift spring itself. Now in this case since the other three lock plates still had their springs attached, I did not want to bend just one of them. Somehow this did not feel Beoloving enough. So I came up with this fix:

A 3D printed wedge that fits to the bottom of the lock plate:

I glued it to the bottom of the plate using double sided tape. I always try to do things in a reversible way in case someone comes up with a better fix in the future and wants to remove my fix. 

When I put the aluminum plate in and pushed the plinth back, this wedge very satisfyingly pulled the plate down to where it should sit. All good now with this plate lock! No detail to small for my attention! This is Beolove! On to the platter and sub-chassis adjustment.