Cassette player / Line in mod

[Otis_P_Jivefunk]

I have done the line in mod from the platonoff DIY section on my 1997 900 SE. The problem I'm having is after the tape player runs for a little while, it stops playing and acts like it ejects the tape, then it will not play until the unit cools down. The sound is great when it's working.

I tried taking the belt off the wheels inside thinking it would help the unit not get so hot but doesn't seem to help. Now it won't play at all, when i trigger the tape player, it plays, then rewinds then plays and ejects.

Any ideas on how to fix this other then buying another head unit?

[Demusku]

When i did it it just worked and the 2 lead wire your suppose to solder on each side of that cut dont do anything. However when my friend did it a week later and he was having similar problems to yours. It would play for a bit and then stop work. After disassembling it a couple times to check the work he just jammed the butter knife/stereo removal tool into the cassette opening and jammed it around a whole bunch and its been working for about a month now.

Only thing we can figure is he somehow wedged the part the detects the cassette is in the player down. But i really have no educated guess as to what he could have "fixed" by doing that.

[Otis_P_Jivefunk]

I did the mod just like the DIY said, I cut the line on the circuit board and added a micro switch behind the cassette door. When I press it, it thinks I loaded the tape like it should. I even put the belt back on and tried to play a real tape and that no longer works.

Maybe I should just buy a used head unit and use the cassette player out of it.

[Otis_P_Jivefunk]

Well I finally got my problem fixed, I found another radio in town for $30. The guy even called some saab place in jacksonville and got the code for me. Before I had the code, I took the cassette assembly out and installed it into my radio, it was doing the same thing. It would only play for a second or two then stop.

So I figured my radio was the problem, I got the code for the new radio and now it works great! I'm really amazed how good the stock system sounds. The line in mod I got from platonoff works like a charm.

[jonathans]

in theory a good test for this problem would be to find an old tape, or a cleaning tape, or just buy one of those adapters where you plug the tape in and it has an audio lead that comes out through the door, and just stick that in there.

if you've done the mod right, it should help diagnose any radio issue. iirc even if you use a real tape with audio on it, there should be no input from the deck anymore, just some background static.

it won't eject the dummy tape unless something else is wrong, and the audio from your ipod or whatever should still be loud and clear, so you'd be able to work from there without having to buy a second radio.