DES: Akai R-7M 7" metal reel

Akai is probably the brand who made more different designs for their 7" metal reels. This one described here is the design with blue AKAI lettering.




Akai R-7M reel.


It has three holes in-line with no slot. The reel is silver with the AKAI lettering in blue. The design is identical on both sides, no differences. It has three screws and three "blind slots".

The reel is very light with made by thin aluminium, but is consistent. The distance between the both flanges is a few just, however is rare that the tape touches any of them.





The original box.




A pair of AKAI reels in their boxes.




The reels in an Akai deck, the GX-77

DES / VID: Tandberg TD 20A

This was the top of the line reel to reel deck made by Tandberg and can handle up to 10.5" reels . It was sold in two versions: 4 tracks and 2 tracks.

The 4 tracks version came with the standard domestic speeds: 9.5 cms / 3.75 ips and 19 cms / 7.5 ips, while the 2 tracks version came with the professional speeds: 19 cms / 7.5 ips and 38 cms / 15 ips.



Instead of the typical 3 motor design, this deck has 4 motors: one per each reel, one for the capstan and the last one for pinch roller engage. I think this deck was the only one made with this feature instead of the most typical design by solenoid.

But there are more odd things. For example, this deck doesn't have a PAUSE button. It's rare, but I think the explanation is the system used to engage the pinch roller.

Other odd is that isn't neccesary to press the record and play buttons at the same time, it's only needed to press the record button and the deck goes into the recording mode if at least one of the record switches are selected. When a record switch is on, the "stand by" led lights.

All transport functions are led lighted, even the "stop" and all leds are red.



There's one feature that it's curious: the "free" mode. When "stop" and "wind" buttons are pressed at the same time, the led with the "free" function lights. In that mode the brakes are released and both reels can be manipulated by hand without any friction.

If the "edit / cue" switch is on, the sound can be heared while the reels are manipulated by hand. To end the free mode, just press "stop" and the deck will tight the tape.




Bias adjustment can be done individually per each channel with two pots that are in the front face of the deck and there are individual pots for the input signals per channel (line 1 and line 2 / mic), mic attenuator and output signal.


And here is the Tandberg TD 20A in action:

But, how is the 4th motor? how does it work exactly?. Look:

DES: The story of Star Wars and OST

This a good collector's item that I found sometime ago in mint state, never used.

I think that this boxset was only released in open reel tape at the end of 70's, just after the theatrical release of the movie. Separatelly was released in vinyl too.

There are two tapes recorded at 7.5 ips - 19 cm/s in 4 track stereo configuration, plus a complete list of all components of the orchesta and an album with high quality pictures of the movie.

The sound quality is good in both tapes. The first tape contains the original soundtrack composed by John Williams and the second tape contains the story of Star Wars, that is basically the sound of the original movie, but with a narrator that conduces the story. The total running time of the story is about 50 minutes.

Here are some pics of this collector's item:

DES: Ampex 7" metal reel

Never known that Ampex did metal reels of 7" diameter. I was lucky to find some of them in the same lot.

It has three holes in-line, three screws and is easy to thread thanks to a large loading line.

Spinning at 9.5 cm/s

Front view

There is a "blind slot" in the inner circle of the reel, like another spindle hole, but without the star shape, just the circle. Maybe it was used to hang the reel...

The lettering is identical in both sides, "AMPEX" in the first line (bold and capital letters) and "audio supply" in a second line in a smaller font size. Each side is labeled as "1" or "2".

DES: Teac 7" metal black reel

That reel is unusual. Black metal reel with the TEAC logo painted in gold. I think that only existed the 7" version and wasn't made in 10.5" with the same design.

It has three holes off-set and uses four philips anodized screws and has a slot to hold the tape.

A pair of reels like this makes a good visual result with a TEAC black faced deck, as the X1000 or X2000.

DES: Pioneer PR-85 7" metal reel

Now is the turn of one of the most wanted 7" metal reels, the original one that came with the Pioneer models RT-701 and RT-707. However, it was also sold separately.

It has six holes "in line" with three screws and it's very light because the holes are really big and between each one, there is a radius that goes to the center hub. There is also present a single slot to hold the tape.

The aluminium is very delicated because of the size of the holes. The central hub has three marks to hold the spindle in the right position while pressing the reel.

Here are some shots of this beauty:

Stopped





Closer look






Running at 9.5 cm/s




With the reel full of tape

DES: TDK AR-7M 7" metal reel

TDK 10.5" metal reels are found usually, both two and three holes design, but the 2 holes version in 7" size is not so usual, so, here is.

I bought this one one year ago more or less, and was unopened, perfect condition in all ways. This is the only one that I've found for sale in some years looking for it.

Here are some shots in a Pioneer RT-707 together with a Revox 7" metal blue reel.

Stopped




Closer look




"TDK 178". The size in milimetres.




Running at 9.5 cm/s

DES: ReVox 7" metal golden reel

Previously I did the entries for the blue and red ReVox 7" metal reels. Now is the turn of the golden "champaign" reel. Identical to the other ones, except the color.

DES: Bulk tape eraser

What is a bulk tape eraser?. It's a device that can produce an AC magnetic field which will erase an entire magnetic media.

There are different types of bulk erasers depending of the media that will be erased and with different power of erase. This power is measured in oesterds. A higher oesterds value means a higher power to erase.

Here is bulk tape eraser used to make "like a virgin" any 1/4" open reel tape:

Teac E-2 bulk tape eraser

It has just one switch to power on or off the device and a red lamp that shows when it's working.

In the top of the device there's a single spindle where the reel must be placed:

If you want to erase a reel with NAB hub, it's so easy as to use a NAB hub adapter with it like is shown in the next picture:

The correct procedure to erase the tape is:

1- Be sure you are very far away from anything that is magnetic and can be damaged and/or affected by the intense magnetic field generated by the devide, like TVs, videos, external hard drives, computers, watches... etc.

2-Put the tape one feet (more or less) away from the bulk eraser and turn it on.

3- Slowly, close the reel to the bulk eraser and put it in the spindle.

4- Slowly, with your hand, make a complete revolution at least to the reel, so that the powerful part of the eraser affects any part of the reel.

5- Slowly, move away the reel from the bulk eraser until it will be one feet away from it.

6- Turn off the bulk eraser.

The result will be a tape completly erased in just a few seconds.

But, when it's really useful to use a bulk eraser?. For example, when we want to record over a tape that is recorded in half track, using a quater track configuration.

Why?. Because without using a bulk tape eraser, the quater track deck can't erase completly both tracks and the old program recorded in the tape will be audible very low when the new program is between tracks.

DES: Scotch 10.5" six holes metal blue reel

After some time looking for a pair of these beauties, recently I've adquired them separately.

The design (six holes "in line") was common used by different brands like Scotch and Basf and was also used in the well known Teac RE-1003 and Pioneer PR-101 empty reels.

Here are three shots taken in the Pioneer RT-1020H with ReVox metal silver NAB hub adapters.

DES: ReVox 7" metal red reel

Identical than the blue model except for the color (click here to read the entry dedicated to the blue reel), this one looks also very nice in most decks, however looks incredible in the Pioneer RT-707.

DES: Hubs

What is a hub?.

A hub is the axis where a reel is put in a reel to reel tape recorder. There are two main standards about it, the european and the american.

The european hub is more or less than the same used in the 8mm projectors.




There are reels from 2.5" to 10.5" that need an european hub. Maybe ir's rare the use of this thin hub in the bigger reels, but were the common in plastic reels like Philips or Revox.






The american hub is wider, about 76 mm of diameter.




Except some professionals decks, reel to reel machines came with european hub as a standard, so to use a reel with american hub, it's needed an adapter.

Most reels with american hub are 10.5", but there were some rare exceptions like some 7" reels.

European to american hub adapters are known as NAB hub adapters and there were different types, from the cheapest made of plastic that were put first in the reel, and in second place in the european hub, to the expensive ones that were put directly in the european hub and then, the reel over them.

The first method is less confortable because to remove a reel and put another one, it's needed to remove the adapter from the reel table and put it again in the new reel.

With expensive adapters, the adapter irself is placed in the reel table as it were the natural hub of the deck, so when is needed to put a tape, the time used in the procedure is the same as the original hub of the machine were american.

American and european hubs weren't used in their respective productions. The common is always the european hub except in most cases, in the 10.5" reels.

Here are some examples of cheap NAB hub adapters:












Today some of these adapters are collectables pieces so their price is high, as occurs with the Pioneer PP-220 adapters.


Expensive adapters were maybe the common ones. Brands like AKAI, Teac, Otari, Revox, Basf... made good adapters that were put directly in the reel tables.









The best (and expensive too) hub adapters maybe are the metal Revox adapters. They were produced in different metal colors, the same that the metal reels produced by the brand: light aluminium, red, blue, black and gold.