How to Clean your VCR Heads

A common cause of poor pictures is easy fixed

The simplest way to clean the head would be with a wet type cleaner tape these have a type of paper tape in them that alcohol is applied to and are played for a few seconds, this may fix many dirty head problems but some times the only way to attack the problem is manual cleaning.

Many people blame dirty heads for every problem their video has from tapes not ejecting to channels not tuned! the only thing head cleaning can fix is poor playback and tracking quality (some units display a blue screen when they cant track the tape).

The first thing to do when attempting manual cleaning is to unplug the VCR and take the lid off. make sure you unplug the power as there are many high voltages in a VCR and you don't want to get fried. Next identify the head drum it is the large shinny silver (sometimes gold) drum that sits in front of where a loaded tape would be. On the bottom of the drum would be two to sometimes four or 6 small black chips about the size of a flat match, these are the heads and are extremely fragile. do not poke them or touch them with anything sharp etc as they are fragile and expensive. if a head gets broken you would have to buy a new head drum and this is very expensive, we know we have repeated ourselves a bit here but we wanted to point out how fragile the heads can be.

To clean by hand, you will need what are called 'head cleaning sticks'. These are covered by a type of chamois and are safe to use if used properly some people also use paper but great care must be taken. Firstly moisten the cleaning stick with head cleaner which is probably just pure isopropyl alcohol then place the flat chamois part next to the head drum, Do not rub the stick on the drum you may break a head off. With the moist stick against the drum you should be able to move the drum around as they normally will spin freely. After a couple of revolutions of the drum you can take the stick away and you may not some dirt is now on the stick. when using isopropyl alcohol you will need to leave the unit sit for a few minuets before reassembly and testing, to allow any excess moisture to evaporate. one final point is never use cotton buds (q-tip) to clean the heads as the fluff from the cotton bud will catch on the head either damaging the head or making the picture worse and never tip the alcohol directly on the mechanism.