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Hi Tom
Funny, I had that same feeling like somehow the continents have 
something to do with how the tapes perform. Israel's weather is 
something like NC(mostly). About your experience with PEM are you sure 
if wasn't the 469? Agfa made that tape that was supposed to be bias and 
EQ compatible with 456 so that people could get the 468 sound without 
calibrating their transports. It was a really crappy tape that oozed out 
of the box, shed like a long haired dog and pissed everyone off. They 
made changes to the formula and later badges were supposed to be better. 
I transfered some last year and they were in need of light baking only.
BASF tapes usually pack tight because of the German one flange system. 
It has to pack well or it goes off the bobby. Thinking about it, after 
years of using BASF tapes I never ran across a bad batch. There were 
obviously better and worse tapes but after working with them 10-30 years 
ago and now digitizing them, not a single tape that needed baking or 
treatment. Weird.
Scotch 176 is another tape that lasts out here but the others, the 200 
series, the classic, master, etc, don't get me started on them.
Nice weather in Atlanta.
Cheers
Shai

בתאריך 2/17/2012 5:07 PM, ציטוט Tom Fine:
> 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.
>>
>