Laser Pickup - lubricant for slide

[mjz3348]

I am replacing a laser pickup in my Marantz SA-11s1 SACD player.
(It uses the Hitachi HOP-1200R laser)

Would someone recommend a lubricant I should use for the rails that the laser pickup slides on?

[tvrgeek]

I am not sure the rails are designed to be lubricated. If you did, it should be a dry film type of some sort. Krytox based maybe.

[Mooly]

Manufacturers have their own potions and stuff
Is it metal on metal or is there any metal on plastic involved.
For CD pickups I use a special "plastics" grease that's suitable for use on metal/plastic too. When you find something that works you tend to stick with it.

This stuff,
ELECTROLUBE|SPG35SL|SPECIAL PLASTICS GREASE 35ML | CPC

[Extreme_Boky]

I use Dry Glide dry film lubricating treatment with Teflon to lubricate slides.

For gears I use TAMIYA grease - excellent: Tamiya America Item #87025 | Ceramic Grease

Boky

[Zen Mod]

round metal rails - any type of thin oil

slides of any type , also all sort of gears - vaseline

there is no need for over-engineering there

[Extreme_Boky]

From my experience, the oils draw dust and are bad for rails, in particular if left uncleaned for long time…
Also, some types of gear grease will harden over time, causing mechanical and electrical stress - resulting in intermittent problems.... but whatever works for you... stick to it.

Boky

[prairiemystic]

A plastic safe grease like silicone grease or Molylube is suitable for cams and the roller guide tracks. The techs I know swear by Molylube, it has proven itself in VCRs. Haven't tried lithium grease. Never WD40!

[tiefbassuebertr]

Originally Posted by Zen Mod

round metal rails - any type of thin oil
slides of any type , also all sort of gears - vaseline
there is no need for over-engineering there

But sometimes they do. By some cd players from Yamaha (metal/plastic) only the oil suggested from Mooly by post #3 gave me a satisfactory functional results regarded the tracking behavior. One of this player (I have forget the model No) was by three different service center before (one of them was the Yamaha Service CENTER itself and claims also "there is no need for over-engineering there" concerning the sliding behaviour) - without the wished success. The observed error was sporadic skipping about some tracks. Approximately three years the player was by me (I needed to find that out) and the user now is happy to use his old model again.

But in general - the sliding behavior between metal and plastic is highly dependent on the type of plastic, thus also fom the kind of lubricant. I have heard of certain oils, which decompose the plastic.
Regarded the sliding behavior between metal/metal I think the same than ZEN-MOD.

Here the overview of all products from Mooly's suggestion brand by post #3
http://www.electrolube.com/049/docs/catalog.pdf (German)
http://www.hkw.co.uk/docs/catalog.pdf (english)

Here an URL regarded replacing of Hitachi's HOP-1200S:
Replacing laser pick-up

[georgehifi]

Don't use any petroleum based oil or grease unless it's only on metal to metal contact even Vaseline is petroleum based, if there is any plastics involved they will decay in time either softening or become brittle.
This is the "cheapest" safest grease I've found for plastic or metal, it's caster bean based, no petroleum products used. PBR disc brake rubber seal grease.

PBR Rubber Grease - 17.5 gm tube, prices

Cheers George