I remember doing this a couple of times in my " professional past" - it is actually a fairly straight forward process that requires a piece of scotch tape and a small phillips screw driver. You open the case by removing the screws. There is a top and a bottom part. Keep the bottom part on a flat surface and make sure that none of the little rollers fall out. If you are not sure how to rethread the tape through the various rollers, open up another VHS tape to compare. The actual break in the tape may have occurred either somewhere in the middle, between the transparent leader and the tape, or directly on the take-up reel. If it occurred on the take-up reel, you can remove the retainer and rethread the tape at that spot. If the break occurred between the leader and the actual tape or somewhere in the tape, cut both ends and also cut off any crumpled tape (you may lose a second or two) - put both end , shiny surface up, on a flat surface (it helps to have somebody align the two ends for you) and put a piece of scotch tape on the two ends to reconnect them. Then cut off any excess scotch tape on both side. This sloppy repair will at least allow you to play the tape again and copy it over to a DVD quickly! Professionals have a special tool for this repair and also use special tape. Good luck! Otmar *********************************************** LLTI is a service of IALLT, the International Association for Language Learning (http://iallt.org/), and The Consortium for Language Teaching and Learning (http://www.languageconsortium.org/). Join IALLT at http://iallt.org. Subscribe, unsubscribe, search the archives at http://listserv.dartmouth.edu/scripts/wa.exe?A0=LLTI Otmar Foelsche, LLTI-Editor ([log in to unmask]) ***********************************************