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-   -   Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck. (https://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/showthread.php?t=68177)

Michael Maurice 16th Apr 2011 9:22 am

Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
4 Attachment(s)
There have been many threads regarding the Collaro Conquest Record Player / Changer.

I've now had the opportunity to strip and service one and will describe how its done with pictures that I've taken.

This guide should be used in conjunction with the service sheet which can be found here: https://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/...llaro+conquest


This is the underside of the deck
Attachment 49585

Start by turning the deck upside down

Unsolder the wire from the pick up arm, and remove the circlip from the overarm
Attachment 49586

Unclip the wire from the sub chassis and remove the two bolts that hold the bottom bearing to the motor
Attachment 49587

Gently prise the bottom bearing up, it will be quite stiff to expose the bottom of the armature
Attachment 49588

Michael Maurice 16th Apr 2011 9:38 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
5 Attachment(s)
Turn the turntable the right way up

Lift out the overarm. put it aside safely

Remove the turntable by removing the circlip in the centre.

Loosen the two screws that hold the pick up arm in place lift off the arm and put it aside safely.
Attachment 49590

Remove the turntable idler wheel and put it aside, loosen the two screws on the larger changer pulley and lift it off. It might need a bit tight.Attachment 49591

Pull off the motor pulley complete with spring, do not lift out the fan, you'll distort the blades.
Attachment 49592

With a suitable tool, gently tap the top of the motor spindle so the armature falls of of the bottom, the fan can then be taken out.

Remove the five screws arrowed that secure the sub chassis to the main deck.
Attachment 49593

The sub chassis should drop out from the deck.

Attachment 49594

Michael Maurice 16th Apr 2011 9:50 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
4 Attachment(s)
Remove the speed changer knob
Attachment 49595

Remove the circlips holding the shaft and manual lever in place
Attachment 49596

Ensure that the shaft arrowed is clean and free from oil, grease and dirt, it must be easily moved up ad down and the spring should return it to the down position,
Attachment 49597

Remove the speed changer shaft and clean it.
Attachment 49598

Michael Maurice 16th Apr 2011 10:02 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
1 Attachment(s)
Thoroughly clean the motor bearings, the felt absorbers and the shaft of the armature. I use IPA for this, and let the IPA dry out, lubricate the bearings with light oil, like sewing machine oil, dont use 3 in 1 and never use WD40. You should ensure that the felt pads are full with oil.

When this is done refit the armature to the motor, and refit the bottom bearing, what I do is to gently tap this bearing into place then tighten each screw a little at a time until they are tight.

Check to see that the shaft rotates freely.

Fit the fan and push it down a little way, dont push it to the bottom as it will foul the top of the motor.
Attachment 49599

Put the motor pulley on and gently tap it down on to the shaft. This action will push the fan down into its correct position.

Clean old grease off the linkages and refit the speed changer arm and check to see that everything works as it should.

Clean all grease off the overarm shaft, relubricate with some light grease, refit the overarm and secure it with a circlip.

At this stage you have serviced the main deck and motor unit.

Michael Maurice 16th Apr 2011 10:30 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
5 Attachment(s)
The next stage is to service the changer mechanism.

Gently move the lever that controls the arm out away from the cam
Attachment 49600 Attachment 49601

Remove the circlip and lift out the cam, you may have to rotate and lift it but it will come out. There is a washer underneath the circlip, do not lose it.
Attachment 49602

Remove the nut arrowed.
Attachment 49603

Remove the circlip and lift out the arm this arm is known as 5242 in the service manual
Attachment 49604

Michael Maurice 16th Apr 2011 10:49 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
5 Attachment(s)
Thoroughly clean the shaft and bearing of this lever.
Attachment 49605

It is imperative that the trip mechanism is free to move, the parts are indicated by the arrow, remove them, thoroughly clean them and refit, do not use any oil. You can refit the arm and move it making sure there is no resistance as it moves the trip lever, you should treat this as the same way you would a trip pawl in a Garrard or BSR deck.
Attachment 49606 Attachment 49607

Thoroughly clean the cam gear and make sure all grooves are free from grease. There is a tiny bit of grease on the underside of this gear, clean it off and apply fresh grease.
Attachment 49608

Refit the lever with the gear making sure it is free to move in the sub chassis, refit the nut underneath. This is often a reason why the changer either doesn't start of continues to change after the record drops. It moves the large idler either to the motor pulley or away after its finished changing.

Refit the cam gear, you will have to rotate it a bit, make sure it goes all the way down, refit the washer and the circlip. Do not leave out the washer, if you do the gear will be too high and the arm will not go high enough to touch the side of the record.
Attachment 49609 Move the lever for the arm back onto the cam

You have now serviced the sub chassis.

Refit the sub chassis to the main deck, refit the arm and tighten the two screws.

Refit the large pulley and tighten the screws.

Connect the deck to the mains.

Operate the lever to the side of the speed selector knob and check the motor is running.

Turn the RH control to reject, if all is working well, the arm should rise, go to the centre and return to its rest.

The next check is to ensure the arm rises high enough to touch the record, this is done visually, just make sure that the middle of the cartridge end arm is at the the step on the spindle.

When you are happy that all is well, refit the turntable and secure with the circlip, also reclip the motor wiring to the sub chassis.

Refit the turntable and enjoy playing your records.

julie_m 16th Apr 2011 7:00 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Many thanks for this, MM.

MichaelR 16th Apr 2011 7:12 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Excellent masterclass....thank you
Mike

D_S_J_R 17th Apr 2011 4:36 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Sincere thanks from me as well. Hope to have one of these next month :)

Alulles 2nd May 2011 3:51 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
1 Attachment(s)
Michael. I've retrieved my Conquest from storage and started the restoration. But I have one problem. I've removed the central circlip that holds on the platter, but the platter itself would not come free, so I removed the platter by removing the three screws that hold it onto the top part of the bearing. But I just cannot get that part of the bearing free. This prevents the sub chassis from being removed as the top part of the bearing will not go throught the central hole in the chassis.

Can you remember if you had this problem? Or is it just nature's weld holding the two part of the bearing together. I've flooded it with lubricant in the hope that it will free itself.

Photo is of the bearing showing the part that need to be removed.

If you can help I'd be grateful

(edit) Found out the reason. A tiny section of the inner bronze bushing had broken off. It had gouged the ball-race and resulting debri had 'stuck' the two parts of the bearing together. Think I can save it.

Michael Maurice 2nd May 2011 5:36 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
It looks like you've manage to separate them, you might need to replace the ball race but you might be able to get something similar at an engineering shop.

There are usually plenty of Collaro's on Ebay, if the worse comes to the worst, buy one and strip it for spares.

Alulles 2nd May 2011 6:59 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
I think the ball race is savable. I now have another problem of the changer 'hanging' at the top of it's loop, just as it's about to drop a record. All of the mecjh has been cleaned except fcor the internals of the spindle. Has to be that I think.

Thanks for your help

Michael Maurice 2nd May 2011 9:05 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
There is a part of the top part of the spindle that should be free to move up and down, make sure it isn't stiff or seized.

Alulles 3rd May 2011 1:35 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Thanks Michael. Just about complete. The final sticking point was the forked piece at the bottom of the spindle that helps to release the record. After some adjustment it is fine.
All went well in the end due to your tutorial.
Cheers.
Al

af024 7th Jun 2011 9:04 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Hello Michael,

Thank you for all this, I bet it took some documenting!

If I may, I have a question about item 5344 shown in Fig 3. In particular I wondered if there was something between it and the gear cam surface - perhaps something like a roller? Mine seems to run metal to metal and it looks a bit like something might be missing. Also, in order to get the arm to lift high enough on the measure part of the cycle, I've had to turn the adjuster screw almost all the way. Alternatively, I did wonder whether the gear/cam mounting post might be keyed where the mounting nut (and spring are located) and perhaps I hadn't keyed it back in properly. Did you notice whether it was keyed perhaps? I may have to take it to bits again to see.

The other interesting thing (although not connected to the above question) is an observation about the alternative part 5234 (versus 5246) - again Fig 3. It looks like I have the 5234 option (ie no shorting of the P.U. during the cycle option).

The final little niggly issue I have is that it doesn't want to turn off at the end of the cycle. It very nearly does, but the control doesn't fully return to the off position. Perhaps I've forgotten to replenish a critical bit of grease somewhere?

I'm sure I'll get there at some point but if you have any pointers along the way, that would be great.

Other than that, all is well. The original fault was tight motor bearings, but that's running like a good'un now.

Regards,

Andy
PS I wonder if the deck will manage to cue-up a 6" 'Kidditunes'-type record, or is that just going a bit too far?

Michael Maurice 8th Jun 2011 12:21 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
1 Attachment(s)
Andy there is a roller between item 5344 and the cam gear. (arrowed in picture) The fact that its missing is the reason why the PU height is wrong.

fidobsa 8th Jun 2011 8:01 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Can I add my thanks for this information. I will have another go at my deck sometime.

af024 9th Jun 2011 6:03 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Hello Michael,

Ah, so there a roller should be there then. Mmmmm.. now that does represent a bit of a problem.

Thank you for confirming this.

Dear oh dear.

Regards,


Andy

af024 9th Jun 2011 11:02 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Update
Roller now back in captivity, fitted and working fine following reinstatement of original cueing height adjustment.

It just fell out following the separation of the cam gear. It just sits in a slot and it held in there under spring clamping. Separate the gear and it will just fall out and hide itself in the most obscure place on the workbench where you can't see it!

Beware of losing this item guys!!

Thank you for showing me what I was looking for.

Regards,

Andy

ben 10th Jun 2011 12:18 am

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by af024 (Post 438388)
PS I wonder if the deck will manage to cue-up a 6" 'Kidditunes'-type record, or is that just going a bit too far?

My first ever record player as a 6 year old was an EAR Music maker with collaro conquest- and guess what records I used to stack up on that spindle... :):) Amazing players, these.

af024 10th Jun 2011 5:59 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
Amazing indeed Ben!

Regards,


Andy

Edward Huggins 19th Jul 2020 2:06 pm

Re: Collaro Conquest - a pictorial guide to servicing this deck.
 
There were a number of versions based on this Autochanger including the "Challenger" and the later, more refined, "Studio". Then came the Maganvox US versions.

Collaro never made anything easy and the pick-up set set down position on the earliest versions has to be accessed by removing the platter. At the one o'clock position on the deck plate you will see a fine slotted brass screw. This actuates the spacing on an eccentric cam. Turning to the left pulls the pick-up set down in towards the record centre and the opposite by turning to the right. This adjustment is quite sensitive, but positive in its action. It's quite fiddly as on the earliest versions of the Conquest, one needs to remove the platter each time so as to test it out by trial and error.

Later versions provided a hole in the platter to allow more more ready access. Just lift up the mat, no need to remove it. This info may help those who have an out-of-adjustment deck and can be read in conjunction with Michael Maurice's excellent pictorial guide.


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