Roland R-8
Repairing and Restoring the Roland R-8

I can't tell you how long I have been waiting to get to this project. The potted history of the acquisition of my R-8 is set out below. I acquired the R-8 prior to moving into the new house and have used it sporadically.

In this video I discuss what I think the project entails before I start the actual instrument strip down in part 2.

​

In short at this point I thought the project was:

• replace the screen

• replace the battery (something I might as well do while undertaking maintenance

• give the unit a good clean

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

Several YouTubers have in the past asked how to strip down the R-8.

Well as part of this project here is the video that shows you how to access the internals of the R-8 down to the screen and strike pads.

​

​Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

The project has identified that the display on the target R-8 is not functioning correctly.

The display on the donor R-8 needs to be removed so I can transplant it into the target drum machine.

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

Installing the donor R-8 display into the target machine leads to an unexpected result.

Basically the donor display displays the same issue in the target machine as the target machine's display.

This has resulted in me comparing the main board from the target and donor machines. Following the comparison I have decided to change the direction of the project.

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

A change of direction of the R-8 project.

I start by cleaning some grubby areas of the main board. Dealing with the rust on the faders and applying some contact cleaner to the fader tracks. Replacing a missing circuit board pillar.

And finishing up with removing the metal back plate from the power and main boards so I can removed the rust and repaint this before I re-install it.

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

Some months ago I stripped down the Roland R-8 and discovered that the back plates that are enclosed within the plastic case of the drum machine were badly damaged.

The back plate on the source machine was far worse than the back plate on the target machine. But both were in need of restoration work.

Now I know that this component of the Roland R-8 never gets scene, but I didn't feel right putting the drum machine back together knowing that this component was so damaged.

At the time of stripping down the Roland R-8 the weather was not good enough to work outside to strip down the metal plate to base metal and then re-paint it.

In the meantime I did consider getting these stripped by blasting and then having them powder coated. I approached a few companies in the area where I live about undertaking this work. Many weren't interested as there were not enough components to make it worth while for them, and a couple of others gave me quotes that were so expensive that it was not economical to go down this route.

So we came back to stripping the paint off using the equipment in the workshop and spraying them with a can of spray paint.

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

In Part 6 my OCD kicked in and I ended up removing the rusty back plates from the Roland R-8(s) bearing in mind I have two of these. The plates were then stripped back to bare metal so all the rust could be removed and they have been resprayed black, which hopefully will stop the rust returning.

In this video we start the re-assembly process. The first task is to re-attach the main circuit board and the input / output board to the back plate ready to installed these back into the plastic case.

It was my intention to actually get the circuit boards back into the lid assembly as well in this video, but on inspection the lid I found it covered in dust and needed cleaning before re-assembly. The cleaning and re-assembly of the lid is covered in the next video.

At the end of this video the circuit boards were reassembled to the refurbished back plate ready to go into the lid assembly.

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

Getting the top panel of the Roland R-8 out to install the backplate / circuitry I realised just how dirty it was. Now this had been in a box since I disassembled the drum machine. So the dirt was probably there from previous use.

This episode starts out by establishing which one of the two boards has a display fault. I established in an earlier video that neither of the two displays were actually faulty. The fault appears to be in the circuitry that drives the display.

Diagnosis of this circuitry will happen in a later video. The immediate aim is to restore one of the Roland R-8's back to working condition.

The next challenge was that the metal bars in the base of the lid assembly were also rusty. So these needed to be treated.

The lid assembly then needed to be stripped down for cleaning before the whole assembly was then put back together.

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.

At last the final stretch on this Roland R-8 restoration.

In this episode I re-install the shield and then the circuit assemble back into the lid assemble of the Roland R-8.

All the connectors from the screen and control surface are then re-attached.

I then deal with a little surface rust on the bottom cover of the Roland R-8 and polish the securing screws before re-attaching the bottom to the lid assembly.

Finally, I discover whether the unit boots up and the screen looks like it is displaying the correct information.

​

Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this drum machine.