Canovision E60 Camcorder

Got this in from the cold! When powered up with the external DC adaptor,it goes into REC mode,but then it will not accept any further commands,e.g.pressing play,FF,or REW.And it cant be powered down with any buttons again.Only way is to disconnect the DC adaptor and reconnect it again!Then you can open up the cassettelid by pressing the Ejectbutton.Pushing the cassette back in and closing the lid,gets the CAM back into REC mode,but no further!A battery was charged up and tested.Showed 7,16V,no load on the meter.The DC adaptors output is

6,7V,no load.Then the battery was fitted on the CAM.And well this time it gets into REC mode(default)By pressing the MODE select button,I can get it into PLAY mode(Green LED comes on),But after that will not accept any further commands.After two attempts doing this,I cant get into the PLAY made.Battery Voltage dropped to 6,9V,no load.Thats as far as I gone with it.Anyone got any clueswhy it is behaving the way it does? TIA Tom

The E60, like many camcorders of that generation, was notorious for faulty electrolytic capacitors. I still have an old E110 lying around (basically a stereo E60 IIRC) which started to get bad caps and I eventually decided to write it off.

Which caps should you replace? All of them- I kid you not! It's a huge job for someone without the experience or tools for surface mount work and not worthwhile on something that old.

There may be a fault elsewhere causing your problems, but my bet is the caps are your source of trouble. You might be able to spot the worst culprits by careful sniffing around the PCBs- the bad caps usually stink of rotting fish and sometimes visibly leak fluid onto the PCB. If this is left unattended to it will rot the PCB traces and eventually render the PCB unrepairable.

Good Luck!

Dave