Can playing new VHS tape really help clean VCR heads?
 

Hello,

I've read a couple mentions online of inserting a brand new, blank VHS tape into a VCR and letting it play for an hour or so. Apparently, this can help clean the VCR heads. Has anyone had any experience or found any truth to this?

I know manually cleaning is the best bet to clean heads (and to avoid the specific VHS head-cleaning tapes), but just curious to see if anyone had any luck with the above suggestion. Thanks!

Sometimes if there's only very light dirt on a video head this might work, but it's not guaranteed. Skilled manual cleaning of the entire tape path, not just the tiny heads within it is highly recommended.

It's so quick and easy to use the printer paper/90+ isopropyl alcohol directly on the had spun in the direction it normally spins (counterclockwise) with light pressure on the paper with cotton swabs/IPA on the rest of the tape path that I personally wouldn't bother for anything else. That and you can visually see when dirt stops coming off of the head. I think some of this "dirt" isn't exactly dirt, but rather lightly oxidized aluminum from the rest of the head drum. So you'll probably always see "something" come off when you do the paper method, but it should be relatively minimal if the heads are clean.

Never hurts to try your tape method though first if you want.

No, tapes won't remove any meaningful dirt.
- Push it around, yes. (Possibly get it stuck inside the head, yes. Yikes!)
- Remove, no.

Thanks for your feedback guys. I haven't manually cleaned VCR heads myself before and came across the following YT video on how to do it. Might have to give it a try in a few weeks before I do some captures.

Some of these Youtube videos really do suck. Most do, actually.
Some don't suck, but do have faults.

For example, in the video above:
- Alcohol matters. Anything below 90% has impurities that (1) don't clean as well, (2) can leave behind residue.
- Chamois is fine. But the quality of the chamois matters, as a bad swab can damage heads.
- Note that you can over-clean a VCR, and damage it.
- Note that cleaning heads is not a fix-all to fix whatever ails the deck. Only clean heads if the proper troubleshoot calls for it, or if the maintenace cycle is time (or if it's new, cycle unknown)