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Clicking noise from cd player?

Charleyrich

Dec 24, 2020
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Dec 24, 2020
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I have an Adcom 575 cd player that makes a clicking sound when playing CD's.

Is it worth fixing? Is there anything basic I can do myself? I do like it's sound.

Thanks,

Charley
 

Martaine2005

May 12, 2015
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Hi Charley poor,
A clicking sound when playing?.
Clicking as in physical clicks or amplified with the music?.

If a physical click, there is obviously something rubbing/obstruction. You would have to open it and narrow it down by looking and listening.
Normally it’s a tooth broken off one of the nylon cogs or carrier tray. But can be simply some foreign object has entered the player.
Have a good look, nothing to lose.
Try to explain in more detail.
Does click speed get faster as disk spins? Etc.


Martin
 

Charleyrich

Dec 24, 2020
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Dec 24, 2020
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Thanks for your reply. The click is mechanical and does not get amplified nor does it speed up as the disk spins.

-Charley
 

Martaine2005

May 12, 2015
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Charley, you’ll need to open the unit up and visually inspect for the clicking sound. If it doesn’t speed up, its not on the rotating parts.
The tray has teeth along it’s edge, check for foreign objects possibly in the grease (if greased).
But a visual inspection (opened) and playing should reveal something.

Martin
 

Technomaniac

Oct 31, 2020
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Charley, I realize this is an oldish post, but I see no post to say you have fixed the problem, so here is a crash course on the mechanicals of a CD or DVD player. The optical led that reads the disc, is mounted on a sled which slides on tracks or rods to traverse the disk from inside to outside (small to large diameter). There is a rack driven by a small pinion fed by a gear train from a motor that powers the movement. The rack is often two racks sandwiched together, and a little coil spring between these racks must be placed in tension, but only a little bit, before the rack pair is meshed with the gear. (Called anti-backlash) This ensures that there is no play between the teeth of the racks and those of the gear, so that any motor drive immediately moves the sled instead of if there was play, there would be a delay in the sled movement. The sled must move positively as there is circuitry which keeps the opto device pointed at the track being read, rather than reading data from say two tracks if it wasn't properly aligned. You can't put too much tension between the racks, just the min. possible. If you for example moved the racks 2 teeth different relative to each other before meshing the gear,, it would get rid of any play to the gear they mesh with, but you are putting too much load on the teeth, and one rack would later jump over a tooth on the gear and you would lose the effectiveness of the idea. So, check on this, also look at any gear such as the pinion on the motor, to make sure that it has not split, when a plastic gear is forced onto a steel shaft, the gear can split, and the teeth either side of the split then become further apart, and will not mesh correctly with the driven gear's teeth. Once you are confident that the gear and rack train are OK, clean the slidey parts, as the lubricant has probably over time, thickened up, which can cause the sled movement to be loaded and sluggish. So, wipe off any old grease or oil on the sliding parts, and put a drop of light oil such as sewing machine oil, either side of the sled, on each rod or track. Movement should feel very free. Then very carefully, clean the lens. If it looks clean and shiny, you may get away without. There is a risk in doing it. You can use a weak detergent on a tissue, but no pressure.The lens panel is mounted on light springs which are fragile. Check that there is no fluff or hairs around the lens or on the tracks, and remove anything that doesn't belong, with tweezers. DO NOT MISTAKE SKINNY WIRES AROUND THE LENS AREA FOR HAIR AND OR FLUFF. Do not pull on the wires with the tweezers or you have a writeoff !
Another thing that can happen, is that the little turntable on which the disc gets clicked, can gradually move down the motor shaft it's pressed onto. On cheap machines, the boss in the centre of the turntable can split where it is pressed onto the motor spindle.If the turntable moves down the shaft, the lens cannot achieve a focus on the track it is looking at. If it moved down a great deal, the turntable can scrape on the deck and make a noise and or not work. If the boss in the centre of the turntable is split, sometimes you can fit a little metal sleeve over it to hold it together and make a firm fit on the motor shaft. I hope I have not been too complicated but I have covered most mechanical problems experienced with CDs and DVDs. Electronic problems are another story..
 

euliedp

Mar 8, 2021
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Mar 8, 2021
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I have a clicking noise from my home CD player. It is a Pioneer 6-disk cartridge unit. It would be what Martaine2005 described on 12/24/2020 as an amplified clicking, and NOT a mechanical clicking. The CD will play, but there is a constant clicking, along with the music, coming from all four of the speakers. When I switch the receiver/amplifier to use the radio or input from my iPod there is no clicking. I tried using can of compressed air (Ultra Duster) to clean out dust from the CD player.
Is it worth buying one of these cleaning disks to try?
Any other suggestions?
 
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Technomaniac

Oct 31, 2020
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Is there any kind of playing time indicator that shows how many minutes and seconds have elapsed since you started it playing?
 

euliedp

Mar 8, 2021
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Is there any kind of playing time indicator that shows how many minutes and seconds have elapsed since you started it playing?
Yes, the counter starts at 000 then shows the seconds counting, at normal speed, as the first song plays. When I push the >> button it goes to the next song and the counter starts at zero again and counts at normal speed.
I also just noticed that the noise (clicking) is repeating. da-da-dit-da-da-dit-da-da-dit.......
 

Technomaniac

Oct 31, 2020
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My Morse Code is a bit rusty, but is the click in time with the incrementation of the counter display?
 

kpatz

Feb 24, 2014
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Does the cadence of the noise vary with disc speed? CDs spin faster on the early tracks than the later ones. If you play the last track on a 60+ minute CD is the noise any different than on the 1st track?
 

euliedp

Mar 8, 2021
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I used a CD that has over 67 minutes of music on 15 tracks. I counted the repeating noise (I'll call it a clac-clac-click to avoid the Morse Code humor). I counted 60 repeats of the clac-clac-click in 33 seconds on track number one. Then I also counted 60 repeats of the clac-clac-click on track number fifteen. So it appears to be the same on first and last track.
 

kpatz

Feb 24, 2014
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I wonder if there's a bad capacitor or a floating ground that's picking up noise/EMI somewhere between the CD player DAC and the preamp circuitry. We've ruled out anything related to disc rotation since the cadence doesn't change.

If you pause the CD does the noise also stop? What if you hold fast forward to make the CD skip rapidly through the song? Any change in the clickies then?

Another possibility is there is a bad RAM buffer between CD and DAC.
 

euliedp

Mar 8, 2021
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When I push Pause, the music and clicking stops.
When I push Fast Forward, or Fast Reverse, the music speeds up but the clicking stays at the same speed and cadence as before.
This is an early 1990's Pioneer component system. It has three components: 1-Receiver/Amplifier, 2-CD player with 6-disc cartridge, 3-Dual Audio Cassette unit.
There is no clicking on the radio, nor when playing a cassette tape.
 

Technomaniac

Oct 31, 2020
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Could be a good idea to check for those pulses on the rails. If you have a CRO you're suitably equipped. If you don't, a crystal earpiece fed through (say) a 0.1 mfd capacitor. Don't try a low impedance one. If you don't have a crystal earpiece, another audio amp fed through something like a .022 uF capacitor. Something to trace where the pulses are. If they're on a rail, could be an electrolytic on that rail gone South. If you knew which rail fed the time elapsed counter, maybe there's an audio stage running from that same rail.
 

euliedp

Mar 8, 2021
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Thanks for the help and information.
Unfortunately I'm more of an electronics user and not an electronic geek/fixer.
I will need to take the unit(s) to a repair shop. Which are hard to come by these days.
And then my question would be, would it cost more for the diagnostics and repair, than the cost of replacing the unit(s).
Time to search the internet for Stereo equipment repair in the Denver, CO area.
 

Technomaniac

Oct 31, 2020
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AND if it's a chip, can you get it anymore.....Gone are the days when the same model was around for ten years, every technician became familiar with it, and had stocked the commonly-failing parts. Yes, a new one will probably be cheaper than this one originally was, but may not last as long. And because of the age of yours, you may pay a fair bit for a repair, and something else may fail shortly after you get it back home. Most people would probably buy a new one. I'm not that smart, and would struggle with the old one. I call it "RECYCLING".
 
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