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My fix for chattering RTR tape

I want to thank everybody who responded to my post about chattering against the heads for certain oxides on RTR tapes. I read about the "bake" solution, but I am pretty sure my problem was not that because I experience no loss of oxide on the heads or guides. Nevertheless I did try "baking" the tapes but the problem persisted.

What worked for me, and I would regard this as a last ditch effort, was to soak a cotton ball in silicone lubricant and wedge the ball in the tape path behind the first rolling guide and the tape heads. The cotton ball provided a small amount of lubricant, but it also provided increased drag from the supply side which, I think, increased the contact between the heads and the tape. I was able to read about a dozen rare tapes this way. Maybe the solution will work from someone else.

Reply to
root
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I have resorted to similar tricks but I suspect a close inspection of the tape path will reveal one or more guides have a crusty oxide residue that has escaped earlier cleaning attempts.

Mark Z.

Reply to
Mark Zacharias

If you're interested in trying it, you can send the tape to where I work and I'll personally run it through the dehydrator. Reply directly to my email if interested. I think Mark Z may be right about stuff on the guides but in addition, I've seen a lot of sticky / chattering tapes that have all been recovered with the bake. Further contamination with lubricants that may react with the tape coatings seems much more dicey to me - probably because I'm not a chemist. BTW, not all the sticky tapes leave goop on the guides though _many do_.

G=B2

Reply to
stratus46

Also after sitting for years the RTR deck could be malfunctioning by not tensioning the tape properly. Especially if it has leather banded mechanical brakes.

Reply to
Meat Plow

On 5/2/2009 1:47 AM snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com spake thus:

All this talk about baking tapes makes me wonder: isn't there a danger that the sticky goop will glue two layers of tape together? Or does the baking de-goopify the stuff, making it adhere to the tape?

I believe it works, based on all the empirical evidence given here, but it's a puzzle exactly *how* it works.

--
Save the Planet
Kill Yourself

- motto of the Church of Euthanasia (http://www.churchofeuthanasia.org/)
Reply to
David Nebenzahl

On May 2, 12:21=A0pm, David Nebenzahl wrote: > On 5/2/2009 1:47 AM snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com spake thus: >

It seems the binders absorb moisture and when you drag the tape through the guides, some binder and oxide comes off the tape and sticks to the guides. This of course raises the friction a LOT and the tape will literally stick to the guides. The worst 2" quad video tape I saw would play 1 second - 15 inches - before it stalled. That was not enough time to achieve servo lock. That tape played fine after a bake. The thing about baking is it can be done again later if needed but my opinion is to get the material on to another format so you never have to handle the original again.

G=B2

Reply to
stratus46

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