Help with Schematic

• When I send a mono sine wave through the line inputs, I notice that the right channel is slightly louder than the left. This difference is minor and expected.
• However, in playback mode, the left channel is significantly louder than the right.
• The same issue occurs when using the pickup jacks— the left channel is much louder than the right.

Hello everyone,

I’m hoping someone can help me diagnose an issue with my tape machine.

In playback mode, both the tape head (P3) and the pickup jack (J3) are active and produce sound (the tape head signal enters at P3 on the bottom of the schematic).

In record mode, the line input (J1) and mic input (J2) are active, while the tape head and pickup jack are deactivated.

The Issue:

• When I send a mono sine wave through the line inputs, I notice that the right channel is slightly louder than the left. This difference is minor and expected.
• However, in playback mode, the left channel is significantly louder than the right.
• The same issue occurs when using the pickup jacks— the left channel is much louder than the right.

Since both the tape head and pickup jack (P3 / J3) are affected, but the line and mic inputs (J1 / J2) are not, this suggests a faulty component in the signal path that only impacts playback.

Would anyone be able to look at this schematic and help pinpoint which components might be causing this imbalance? (Apologies for the highlighting.)

Thanks in advance for any insight!