Wurlitzer 2300 Tone Arm Issue

Hello everyone,

A friend has owned a Wurlitzer 2300 for more than 30 years and it always played well. However, it was recently moved to another room and now there seems to be an issue with the tone arm.

When a selection is made, the record is loaded and starts to spin. The tone arm then moves to the record, but instead of playing the tone arm is immediately pulled back into its resting position. The record is then unloaded.

My friend asked me to look at this because of my engineering background, but I can't seem to find the cause of the problem. I adjusted the tone arm spring nut a bit to increase the pressure of the tone arm, but this did not solve the problem. The tone arm spring seems to be worn out though.

My friend has a service manual, but this seems to be for the 2400 series instead of the 2300 which he owns. The images suggest that there is not a lot of difference between the two models regarding the tone arm, but I didn't find any clues to a possible cause of the problem in this manual.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Best regards from Belgium!

Gert

no knowledge at all when it comes to a Wurlitzer
but from the jukes I have : cut off (end of play ) contact ?



1 mal bearbeitet. Zuletzt am 30.07.13 23:05.

OK. So I check this contact.

Can anyone with Wurlitzer experience point me to the location of the cut off contact in a 2300?

Is there a major difference between models 2400 and 2300? In other words, can I rely on the information (and images) in the 2400 service manual?

Gert

Hello Gert

The mechanisms of both models are almost identical. You can use the service manual fully so. Differences there might be (not necessarily) on the amplifier and the credit unit and of course the cabinet.

The cut-off switch can be found behind the wall on which the tone arm is mounted. It is a big micro switch. But it is not often that this switch is shorted. Perhaps you can describe in more detail what happens when the tone arm is placed on the record. Does he stay up in the lead-in groove or slide immediately to the end of the record? If the tonearm slides down immediately, probably the needle is damaged.

Best regards - charly49

Hello Charly49,

The tone arm does not slide down. It just touches the record and then returns to its resting position.
I've checked the needle yesterday and it is fine.

Regards,

Gert

Hello Gert

In this case you should check whether the cut-off switch is working properly. If you press the lever of the switch, you should hear a click. If in doubt, you can measure the function with an ohmmeter. Furthermore, you should check the Reject button (on the amp). It sometimes happens that the button is blocked in the depressed position.

If the two switches are okay, the fault may only be to find at the Mute & Play Switch. That is the right of the two sets of switches next to the drive motor. If the record is in playing position and the tone arm is on the record, this switch is actuated and turns off the motor. The function and the correct setting should be described in the service manual.

Best regards - charly49

Hello Charly49,

Thanks for the feedback. I'll check the mentioned switches as soon as possible and give the required feedback!

Regards,

Gert

Hello,

I just want to give an update on the above.

I checked wether the cut off switch was working correctly. I pressed the lever on the switch and heard a click. So it seemed to be functioning. The weird thing is what happened next: we selected a record to play and it played normally. The tone arm did not go back to its resting position until the whole record was played.
So it seems that something was blocked in the cut off switch or that the lever didn't operate as required. By testing the lever I must have unblocked whatever was causing the problem. I didn't do anything else than pressing the lever.

So that's one problem gone. There now seems to be some distortion in the sound which isn't normal. The songs play correctly: there is no distortion in the song itself (like for example slower or faster playback), but there is a noise which can be clearly heard when there is a silent moment in the song. It is not a continuous hum, but rather a pulsating noise.
I didn't have time to look into this further, so I will deal with this later.

Thanks all for the feedback!

Regards,

Gert