Hi, I live in the middle of nowhere, with few options for fun, so when a post popped up on CL regarding a "barn find" Yamaha CR 2040 I was like, might as well look, the pictures are blurry but that's a beast to be respected. I ended up grabbing it for $75 because it was very dusty, very grimy, and none of the lights came on during a quick-n-dirty plug in.
Well, what's the worst that can happen, except a hernia, because it weighs almost 50 pounds, and felt like much more because my arms resemble noodles on good days, and this wasn't one of my good days.
I got it home, managed not to destroy it or myself getting down the very flexible wooden stairs (circa 1875 or so) leading to my dirt-floor basement, and there I actually had enough foresight to not place it right on the dirty workbench but first placed it on a pile of boxes, carefully laid down my best dirty rag, and THEN put it on the workbench.
Whadda mess. I cleaned it as much as I could bear, jammed it into a safety outlet (trips if you breathe on it hard), threw on my cheap basement speakers that were $30 20 years ago, and used my phone as AUX input. I held my breath and pushed "On." Stuff happened. The input knob was missing so I had to flutter about, and used some pliers to get it rotated over. Boom, thar it was, sound. Fired right up, output, both channels. But no lights. Hmmm.
Probably a fuse. It wasn't a fuse, all 3 I could easily find tested fine. I pulled one of the bulbs out; yeah, it was dead. That meant that all the lights were really dead (except power light/stereo mode lights). How much use was required to get into that condition? The other possibility is that it was left on 24/7 for a while and when the lights failed somebody stuck it in a closet for 35 years. I could see that as well.
Anyway, I de-oxyed the hell out of the pots, found one possibly-broken push switch related to something I would probably never need, and wondered what I should do.
The cover was nasty plywood and falling apart along one of the edges. And everywhere else. I glued it all up and clamped it.
I ordered some replacement LED lights.
Is that all I really need to do? Should I actually try to clean the interior, which risks me doing something stupid?
Can I just replace the lights, put on the cover, give it a quick polish, and hook it up to my system? I don't care about "restoration" even a bit, as long as it works it's good. It's gonna live under my desk anyway.
Is there something I should do / check or just blissfully continue to carry on?
(clueless in the middle of nowhere)
Well, what's the worst that can happen, except a hernia, because it weighs almost 50 pounds, and felt like much more because my arms resemble noodles on good days, and this wasn't one of my good days.
I got it home, managed not to destroy it or myself getting down the very flexible wooden stairs (circa 1875 or so) leading to my dirt-floor basement, and there I actually had enough foresight to not place it right on the dirty workbench but first placed it on a pile of boxes, carefully laid down my best dirty rag, and THEN put it on the workbench.
Whadda mess. I cleaned it as much as I could bear, jammed it into a safety outlet (trips if you breathe on it hard), threw on my cheap basement speakers that were $30 20 years ago, and used my phone as AUX input. I held my breath and pushed "On." Stuff happened. The input knob was missing so I had to flutter about, and used some pliers to get it rotated over. Boom, thar it was, sound. Fired right up, output, both channels. But no lights. Hmmm.
Probably a fuse. It wasn't a fuse, all 3 I could easily find tested fine. I pulled one of the bulbs out; yeah, it was dead. That meant that all the lights were really dead (except power light/stereo mode lights). How much use was required to get into that condition? The other possibility is that it was left on 24/7 for a while and when the lights failed somebody stuck it in a closet for 35 years. I could see that as well.
Anyway, I de-oxyed the hell out of the pots, found one possibly-broken push switch related to something I would probably never need, and wondered what I should do.
The cover was nasty plywood and falling apart along one of the edges. And everywhere else. I glued it all up and clamped it.
I ordered some replacement LED lights.
Is that all I really need to do? Should I actually try to clean the interior, which risks me doing something stupid?
Can I just replace the lights, put on the cover, give it a quick polish, and hook it up to my system? I don't care about "restoration" even a bit, as long as it works it's good. It's gonna live under my desk anyway.
Is there something I should do / check or just blissfully continue to carry on?
(clueless in the middle of nowhere)
