What Does a Broken Video Head Look Like?

Note: This article is for informative purposes only.
We are not responsible for any damages caused by your attempt to clean
your VCR's video heads. Never touch a moving video head drum

The video head unit is the single most expensive part inside your VCR, so if you clean your video heads yourself please be careful! It's very easy to break or damage the delicate video heads.

Video heads protrude just a little bit from the video drum, just enough to contact the magnetic oxide on the video tape. Over time they wear from continued contact with the tape. New VHS video heads typically protrude 35-45 microns, while 'good' heads usually measure 20 to 30 microns.

When the heads get clogged, the picture looks very snowy. At this point it's easy to get alarmed and start aggressively cleaning the heads. This can lead to damage, as the up-and-down motions with a swab can easily snap off part of the head.

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Signs that your machine may have a clogged or broken video head:

- Your VCR plays SP tapes nicely, but EP/SLP speed tapes look really snowy and jittery

- Your Hi-Fi sound is missing

- In FF search mode you get thick, snowy horizontal bars through the picture

- in the worst instance, there's nothing......just a snowy picture!

Sometimes, if you have a clogged head, you won't know it until you put the tape into FF Scan mode. Often an extra or "trick" video head is used to make the scan look normal. If this extra head is clogged, you'll see fuzzy horizontal bars when scanning through the tape.

Worn video heads present a different problem. After years of use the video tape wears away at the heads, they don't protrude from the head drum as far as they should. Instead of the typical 25-30 microns, the heads only protrude a little bit, between 5-12 microns. At this point you'll start to see ripples, or waves running through the picture. The only cure for broken or worn video heads is installing a replacement video head unit.

~ Tom Grant   Nov 2013  TGrant Photo LLC

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