It's so strange that different tapes perform so differently in different parts of the world. Scotch 
206/207 is pretty much thought of as stable and non-problematic in the U.S. I've never had a problem 
with it, hundreds of reels over 3+ decades, even scraps that were stored in a hot attic for years. I 
did have one reel of Scotch 208 that was tacky if not outright sticky, but I'm not positive it was 
really 208 and now, years later, I wonder if it was sticky because of splice ooze.

Agfa PEM468 is the only tape from that company that I've dealt with, and it was bad. The tape was 
gooey, but not sticky. So it was oily and tacky enough to leave gooey residue on the tape path, but 
not stuck together like sticky-shed. In fact it fast-wound just fine and we didn't realize there was 
a problem until we noted goo on the static guides. The content was un-important so we just tossed 
the tapes, didn't experiment with baking. It was a paying job, not a science project, so no time to 
spend satisfying curiosities. Those Agfa reels were circa early 1980's and had been stored in a 
humid basement, but not so damp that there was any mold or moisture-damage on the packaging.

The only other European tape I've dealt with was BASF brown-oxide, maybe L-something series, 1-mil 
3600 foot reels from the 70's. The tape worked perfectly and the pack was super-precise. I worried 
about the nasty smell coming off the plastic bags inside the boxes, so I recommended that we throw 
them out. The plastic was getting a bit stiff and I think was on the way to getting oily. These were 
recordings made by a private collector and they were really outstanding, she had done a good job 
making the recordings and the playback went without a hitch.

Now watch, we'll have 10 other people who have never had a lick of trouble with PEM468 and 
nightmarish tape-hell with the BASF tape! Strange.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Shai Drori" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, February 17, 2012 7:35 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] AGFA PE46 problems


> My experience with the 206/207 is really bad. Squeals, emulsion separation, a really bad tape 
> here.
> Shai
>
> בתאריך 2/17/2012 2:08 PM, ציטוט Goran Finnberg:
>> Thankfully I have never ever seen any Scotch 206/207 reel exhibit sticky
>> shed.
>