An advert for a Juno 6 for sale on Gumtree referred to a working, recently serviced unit that was, to quote "fair, fully working, and gig-ready condition... It has recently been tested, and all keys, sliders, and switches are functioning". 

It was being offered at £900 and the pictures looked like it was in need of some work, so I figured I could make an offer once I'd seen it - the most I would lose would be a drive over to Stoke Newington, about 40 minutes from me. Contacting the seller was easy, and I drove over on a Sunday with my son to check it out.

We were welcomed into a rather dark and pokey ground floor flat by an Italian woman who pointed to a synth leaning up against the wall with the words 'there it is'. I immediately realised why it had such a mucky end cheek - it had been used as a candle stand! She said she didn't really play, and had found it at a flea market the previous year.

We plugged it in to test it, connected up some headphones and immediately I knew we had a problem. The lights in the flat flickered when I turned it on. The LEDs were not lit, and there was no sound. I referred to the advert and asked about the claims of testing, and it being a working unit. "Ah, that was about a year ago, I have not used it for a while". Really?

There were missing buttons, bent and stiff sliders, grime and dust everywhere, hardened paper masking tape on the front and back and the poor thing had clearly been unloved and neglected for a very long time. I had brought my screwdriver set and a multimeter and asked if it was ok to open it up. The inside was just as dirty - I don't think it had been cleaned in a very long time! So much for having been recently serviced. 

I checked the power rails with everything disconnected from the PSU: 5V, and the +15V and -15V so at least that part was ok. There was clearly something pulling it down further along but I wasn't going to diagnose it there.

Closing it back up I said that I could offer half considering it was a non-working unit, was not in the state it was advertised, and was probably going to need a lot of work. In a beat, she'd accepted and with a bank transfer done there and then I was the proud owner of a 'new' Roland Juno 6!

As James and I walked back to the car we could barely contain our excitement. Another synth to repair and refurbish! I was certain that it was going to be ok - not an easy fix, but a fix none the less. Once we got it home it didn't take long till it was stripped of all the knobs and buttons, the keyboard removed and everything was getting a really good deep clean.

Over the next few weeks I slowly traced the issues, eliminating boards one by one, until I isolated the major issue to a small electrolytic cap on the left hand panel board, right next to the Transpose button. A new 10p capacitor and a bit of soldering was all it took to fix. Yes, I had to get some new sliders, some button caps (from the EU, where the shipping is almost twice the cost of the button!) but most of all what this synth needed was some TLC - and it got it from me in spades. Every last trace of dust gone, the case carefully cleaned and where necessary the gentle use of a black Sharpie to dull dings and scratches. 

And of course it got new gaskets!