Playing open reel tape

[electra225]

I have taken an adventure into the past this afternoon. After accidentally finding that I have a working reel to reel tape deck, I have been playing some of the tapes I haven't heard in YEARS. I have found that if a tape is marked "Taped for Dean" or "Edited Stereo" it is most likely 101 Strings elevator music or Longines Symphonette. "Dean" had absolutely THE worst taste in music I have ever heard. Both of these outfits can take the old standards and turn them into obnoxious noise. No high end, no bass. Noise. There is reel after reel of this stuff. I ran across a Tommy Dorsey tribute factory tape that is really good. I see there is a factory Eddy Arnold tape and some others. I'll have a ball digging thru all this stuff. If I can find the connectors I need ( 1/4" guitar to RCA) I want to run the reel to reel deck thru the Concert Grand to see how that will sound. The deck I'm using is an Akai M-9.

[Firedome]

R to R is fun, and imo a good one playing a new condition tape is the best analog source one can get.
I have a Sony 250a, a fairly basic r to r deck awaiting work. I've picked up a few NOS pre-recorded tapes to play on it when it's ready to use.
I've always wanted a Magnecord, US made in Tulsa OK, true professional quality, 3 motors and all-solenoid controls. When in HS in the mid-'60s an Electrical Engineer neighbor had one and I was mightily impressed with it, now am just waiting for the right one to come along, there's been a couple near misses so far.

[electra225]

I just found the patch cord with all the adapters I need to connect the Akai deck to my Concert Grand. I look forward to that. I don't know the age of the M-9, but it is solid state.

Edit: According to "hifiengine" this deck was built from the 1967 to 1970 era.

[TC Chris]

Akai had a good reputation for tape products back then.

Chris Campbell

[hermitcrab]

Akai has a good rep but the early ones suffered from pot metal disease where the pot metal cams that operate the mech would crumble away... but they do make 3-d printed replacements for the cams. Sony 250 is a good performer for its price point ... first thing to change on those is the motor run cap...I use ceiling fan run caps as replacements

[TC Chris]

Sony 250 is a good performer for its price point ... first thing to change on those is the motor run cap...I use ceiling fan run caps as replacements

Give some more motor-start cap info, please. I've got my old Sony 350. And the even older Bell-based Allied (Knight) 3-motor transport likely needs 'em because the motors are way slow to accelerate. And the older-still 3-motor TDC Stereotone (a mono machine, oddly) is slow to start also. I've never replaced motor start caps. Time to learn.

Chris Campbell

[electra225]

I have been running the wheels off the old Akai deck. I think those tapes were recorded on the Sony 350 (?) that I still have. Very good quality recordings, for the most part. I found some Lawrence Welk material I don't have. It is recorded in hyper stereo, so it must be from the late 1950's. Alice Lon is still the Champagne Lady on the tape. Whoever made these recordings used something like adding machine tape and typed, (with a typewriter, not a computer) the song titles, record albums and model numbers, then put the meter readings of each song before the title. Somebody went to a tremendous amount of work doing that. Only found one bad job of recording so far. One channel of a Gene Watson tape is real faint. Somebody wasn't watching their VU meters. By the way it sounds, I'm guessing they needed to clean their record player needle of fuzz. Fortunately I have the material on another medium, so it's no loss. I have the market cornered on 101 Strings and the Longines Symphony. What a waste of time recording that stuff......

[Firedome]

"I use ceiling fan run caps as replacements" good info, may give that a try.

The Sony 250/250A is a decent economy deck. Our wedding service was recorded on one 52 years ago this summer.
The marriage has lasted, not sure about the tape. I need to get the deck working to listen to it!

[electra225]

I am surprised that these tapes still sound good and are not falling apart. I need to clean the tape heads after about three reels, but good practice dictates cleaning the heads after each tape even in the olden days when this stuff was the bomb. If you don't keep the tape residue off the tape guides and heads, you get that awful "tape squeal" you get when the tape passes over deposits of tape residue. They don't make tape head cleaning compounds anymore, so I use 91% isopropal alcohol, rubbing alcohol, on a Q-Tip. I believe these tapes that are over 60 years old deposit more tape residue now than they did when they were younger.

[TC Chris]

The "tape squeal" is worse now because of binder deterioration. It's from physical catch-and-release, at a high frequency. There are procedures online for rescuing bad cassettes--you bake them at a specific temp and then have a one-time opportunity to re-record them without squeal.

Chris Campbell

[Firedome]

"from physical catch-and-release" ... can you explain what's actually going on here?

[electra225]

I think I have at least one tape that has deteriorated, causing the squeal. Fortunately, I have the material elsewhere. In my particular case, most of the tape squeal I have been experiencing is from poorly maintained and long-term stored reproduction equipment. The heads on the old Akai were black. It took several Q-Tips moistened with alcohol to get the residue off the heads and other hardware that handled the tape. This old tape does deposit debris as it travels, no doubt about that. And, if I played a tape 25 times, it would not be playable anymore. I need to find out what material I want to save, process it to digital, then discard the tape. It is not worth risking losing material, wasting one's time, or gomming up equipment using it again.

[TC Chris]

"from physical catch-and-release" ... can you explain what's actually going on here?

My reply failed. let's try again. It's a physical sticking and release, occurring at audio frequencies. (That's how a violin bow makes the string vibrate). It modulates the audio. It's commonly from deteriorating binder. It became a problem for some kinds of cassettes, seems to me it was BASF, especially. Somewhere I have printed out instructions for baking the cassette, allowing temporary playability so you can record it t another medium. As Greg noted, dirty tape paths can do thr same thing, but I'm inclined to think the crud on the machine parts is from the bad binder goo.

Chris Campbell

[hermitcrab]

Motor caps just offset the phase on the winding , if they go bad, the motor will overheat and burn the winding's and slow down , most use a 1.5 uf run cap and 2.0 uf for 220 applications... finding that size can be difficult as most big box stores have 3 or 4 uf sizes for ceiling fans ... I ordered mine off of fleabay for a few bucks ... Tape squealing is caused by the silicone that has dried up on the tape... I have never tried this , but the R2R aficionados claim that the orange bottle car wax called Nufinish will replenish the silicone and make them play like new... , I guess you override the shut off switch so the player will run directly from one reel to the other , and in between hold a cloth with wax on it lightly to the tape while you FF it and REW it to coat the tape , I guess you do it a few times to remove the dust as the wax dries...

[electra225]

Would that wax be applied on the dull(inside) or the shiny (Outside) part of the tape? I reckon they believe that wax won't hurt the tape heads? If no harm is done to the heads it sounds like a nice idea. If silicone is what goes away, I wonder if using silicone spray like you use on garage doors would work?

[Firedome]

"seems to me it was BASF"
Oi! no wonder my self-recorded cassettes have problems I used BASF almost exclusively.
I have a few TDKs, will have to see what they do. Almost all of them I recorded from new LPs bought by friends at the time,
so might be hard to do now, or find those records again, some are kind of obscure.
The wax thing sounds difficult to do on a cassette and not particularly easy on regular r to r tape even.

[electra225]

My Akai deck has a roller or wheel that I never have figured out what it does. I'll go out to the shop and take a picture and post it to see if anybody can figure it out. By the information in the above few posts, it might be a wheel you put against the tape to add lubrication if necessary. You can put it in the tape path, or you can lock it back away from the tape. It has a "worn away" place with a felt pad inside it. I wonder if you they made a lubrication compound that you put on that wheel or roller to add lubrication. I wonder if a person could use silicone spray on it to knock down tape squeal. The felt pad looks like it runs against the inside of the tape.

[TC Chris]

I get a little nervous about profligate use of silicones around the capstan and pressure roller--friction is what makes the tape move at the right speed.

Chris Campbell