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Art Shifrin wrote: > Years ago I transferred some I.G. Farben paper tape that had been recorded > in 1944. It broke frequently while running @ typical 'modern' tensions. It > was self-evidently more brittle than Brush & 3M paper samples with which > I've worked. > > > I have received an email back from THE Magnetophon expert, Friedrich Engel, restating to me the answer I already knew:: the Germans did not make paper tape. Here is his answer: >> Apart from Fritz Pfleumer's experimental tapes on paper base (trade name of the paper type was Pergamyn), there was no production of paper tape in Germany. Plastics started with cellulose acetate, then came polivinyl chloride, then, in the late 1950ies, polyester. >> 3M as well Japanese producers (and, maybe, a small Austrian company) after WW II started with paper tape, all types very short-living. >> The first tapes on cellulose acetate, coated with carbonyl iron, made between about 1933 and 1935, suffered from poor experience with these material in the Ludwigshafen plant (... why did'nt they ask the I.G. Faren colleagues at Agfa Wolfen works? ...), so these tapes indeed are very brittle today. Richard Hess, years ago, asked me about a sample of grey tape he found in Jack Mullins collection, which turned out to be carbonyl iron tape (visiting Jack Mullin in 1987 he showed me this tape!). R.H. apparently was able to play back the tape, but, if I remember correctly, he had some problems with breaks and ruptures. <<