Bought an Akai M-8 for a good price from an fb listing and he threw some tapes in with it. This was in a Japanese Sergio Mendes. Google is saying the Dave could be Dave Hubert?

So im primarily looking into Beatles reels - which appear to nearly all be twin track mono, 3 ¾ IPS.

Every machine i find is 4 track stereo.

I dont necessarily want to lock myself out of 4 track stereo, but keeping in mind my primary focus is the mono Beatles reels.

Can I use a 4 track stereo machine to playback twin track mono reels, or do I need to find two separate machines. Im looking into a sony TC 377 right now.

Thanks!

Im new to this and audio in general so expect mistakes in measuring and knowledge.
My Philips N4510 i aquired for 17.50 in a second hand store only reccords one side of stereo (Left) but it plays both on a prerecorded tape and sounds great while at it.
The gauges move for the input but the monitor head only reads left and right is blank and theres no audio on the right channel of the tape.
I measured the heads they are all arround 100 ohm
I removed all the small plug in boards and cleaned the contacts and swapped em around ( fixed some other issues like it starting to ffwd when powered up) but the problem stayed on the same side
i sorta checked the switches and cleaned the heads but it didnt help
What should i check next or double check?