Hi, Corey,
Since 206 has come up in reference to 499, I've changed the thread an
hope that the morphed discussions stays here.
I would like to revisit Scotch 206 and 250.
I had variable results with 206 and 250 recently. While they played
reasonably well without baking--and I'm loathe to bake especially
206/207--there was a fair amount of post-playback debris from some of
the reels (and not on others).
The ceramic dancer arm (on the APR-5003V) was the biggest collector of
junk, and it is in contact with the back of the tape. A small amount of
black crusty stuff was deposited on the dancer arm, and one needs to be
careful as the dancer arm (among other inputs to the CPU) is controlling
supply reel tension, excessive stick-slip due to deposits can reduce
transport stability.
Not all reels deposited the same amounts, but this was more constant
than the dusting described below.
Following the tape path, there were small amounts of dust. I've called
that "edge shedding" because it is visible on the formerly white capstan
(that also contacts the back of the tape) and shows up as two dark bands
on the capstan at the edge of the tape.
It is also hard but comes off with Formula 409 and a microfiber dish
towel. Sometimes the edge debris on the top plate will be 1 cm long
"threads" of mag coating that seem to have come off the top or bottom,
but mostly it's a dusting.
One of the four reels of a concert had particularly heavy dusting.
I think the one or two reels of 250 I had dusted more than any of the
206 reels.
One thing I noted was that most of the tapes that had 3M black and white
with plaid timing mark leader tape had the timing marks on the mag coat
side rather than on the backing side. This is actually good as I have
lost mag coat on Maxell UD35 to the timing mark in a couple of instances!
Although the 206s in question were leadered in the normal way and I
noticed no problems with plaid pull-outs of the mag coat.
All-in-all, I think the 206 is holding up reasonably well, but the
PEM468 and PEM428 as well as older tapes (like 3M 176 and earlier) all
seemed to hold up very well. I did not see any 202/203 in this collection.
Any thoughts?
Really how much dusting is acceptable and how much should cause alarm
and how does one deal with it if you feel alarmed?
Cheers,
Richard
On 2022-08-20 3:11 p.m., CBAUDIO wrote:
> My experience with Ampex 499 has been varied although all of that
> particular stock has needed treatment of some kind.
> According to my discussions with him, Shai has experienced problems with
> Scotch 206 while I considered it to be very stable. In all of the
> library's that I have transferred, 206 has been the poster child of
> stability. Israel has a climate similar to Southern California (which is
> where my studio was located) so that can be discounted. Storage conditions?
>
> My $0.02
> CB
> Corey Bailey
> www.baileyzone.net
> --
Richard L. Hess email: [log in to unmask]
Aurora, Ontario, Canada 647 479 2800
http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
Track Format - Speed - Equalization - Azimuth - Noise Reduction
Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.
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