my 92 Camry has the OEM tape deck. Recently it manifested the following symptom/problem when I inserted a tape to play: the mechanism flips back and forth between forard and reverse 3 times, then ejects the tape. Smae thing happens if I try to Fast Forward or Reverse the tape. This is happening with both home-made and store-bought recordings. Need to know (1) cause (2) if this is re-pairable and (3) by me or a technician, assuming i can find someone who works on these.
It is repairable. A rubber band type belt inside the cassette deck is probably worn out. However, once you consider the labor charges, you might just replace it.
The auto-reverse function is triggered when the drive gears stop such as at the end of side one or two. Something is holding up the show in there. Maybe the drive belt as suggested above, debris, broken tape wound around spindle. A good cleaning is always in order first. With the unit out of the car and on the workbench it can easily be dis-assembled and investigated. Good-ol cassette technology, I still don’t trust CDs.
Yep, the first two posters are most likely correct.
Unless you are handy with this type of work, or have a friend who is, it would cost less to replace the deck.
Who still uses cassette tapes? It’s probably repairable, but you can also check ebay and buy another working OEM unit for $20.
Ebay is your easiest route to a fix which is full replacement.