Project: Restoring A SONY WM-EX652 Walkman - Contact Cleaning For "Gum Bar" Battery.

I was trying to measure the amount of Play time having both batteries installed on the Walkman, as I saw some information saying that it should reach almost 40h.
In my case it was no longer than 10h, so at some moment I assumed the charger is not working and the "gum bar" is not charged.
I tried to use it without the AA battery extension and it was not working at all.
After measuring the "gum bar" battery I realized that something else is causing this low amount of Play time, maybe a broken or corroded contact.
I removed one of the face plates of the Walkman, as you can see below:

After removing the screws marked with red color I was able to reach the battery housing:

After a closer look I saw the corroded contact:

In order to clean it I used an old tooth brush and contact cleaner, below you can see the result:

Now the unit is working on both batteries, used together or separated. What is left to be done is to count how many tapes I will be able to listen without charging the batteries.

Project: Restoring A SONY WM-EX652 Walkman - Headset replacement.

Because of the time passed, the rubber (black insulation) of the headset became very stiff; the feel of it was also a little bit strange. In the same time, the acoustics of the headset were not so great.

As a consequence, I tried to replace them with a new set, in-ear model.

First step was to identify a suitable headset with 16ohms impedance. I found this model: SONY MDR-E11LPB.

Then I was opening the remote control, as you can see below:

I was unsoldering the old headset and attached the new one:

Now the headset looks like new and it works like new:

During this procedure I learned, from a colleague of mine who helped me, an important lesson: before soldering the new wires, which were covered with special insulation paint, need to be cleaned by a process of “boiling” in soldering cleaning solution. After this process they can be soldered on the circuit board, otherwise, the soldering compound is not creating enough retention on the board, the wires can’t be soldered.

Project: Restoring A SONY WM-EX652 Walkman.

I was planning for some time to get a walkman, I have a lot of tapes and some times I appreciate listening a good tape.

I found over internet, using Okazii.ro, this model: SONY WM-EX652.

You can see below some pictures, and I will get back latter with details and technical data:

The headset comes together with a remote control and there is also a “gum bar” battery and one AA battery extension.