Denon Dr-M44HX casette deck

[chrisey]

Im hoping someone experienced can give me some advise as to why my casette deck will only record on one chanel (L) but will record on the other chanel (R) when the balance dial is on maximum (R), BUT will still only record minus 15 minus 10 db on the peak meter on that chanel.
Play back is not bad but the left chanel is always stronger than the right.
I have cleaned the heads and the mechanism so am confident that is ok. F/F a R/W is ok with no belt slipping.
Thinking about this im sure this must have happened some months ago when a tape got jammed up.
I still play a lot of tapes so would like to get to the bottom of this fault.
Any help and advise would be greatly appreciated. Of do we have a denon techi in the uk that could fix this for me. i have down loaded a service manual but its all a bit over my head (i think !!!!!)
Thank you chris

[chrisey]

Hi Bob thanks for your mail. have sent you 2 mails but dont think they arrived. IF you can mail me again and leave your Number so i can get in touch Regards Chris

[Mooly]

This may not sound like much help but 98% or more of problems are often mechanical in nature.

I'm not familiar with the exact model but see it's a 3 head design. First thing is to confirm that the record and play head is a siamesed type, that is to say the record and play sections are bonded together. If so this eliminates misalignment issues of one head to the other (unless something is drastically wrong and the tape isn't running parallel to the head).

Is playback of a known good tape OK with correct (same) levels of replay on left and right channels ?

Also make sure the heads are really clean... use a torch to confirm as oxide can be really stubborn to remove sometimes.

Beyond the basics you really need a 'scope and signal generator to confirm the output of the record amplifiers is OK and to check the record bias current of both channels.

Also check your tapes... is there any edge damage or crease running along the tape.