How HARD can I push TAPE???

A

AnalogDimitri

New member
I've recorded onto my Fostex R8 at around +3 to +8db (red lines)
Should I be pushing it hard?
Can I push it even harder?
What kind of sound will that get me?
Is it safe for both the tape machine and the tape?
Should I record at lower levels?
 
It's impossible to damage a tape machine by recording too hot a signal (as long as you don't do something crazy like plug a speaker output into it.)
I've recorded plenty of fuzz bass tracks, and things like that, just by cranking a preamp before the tape input as high as it will go without clipping. The Fostex R8 takes particularly well to this, since it uses Dolby NR, which is basically inactive when the signal is above 0dB. If you use a machine with dbx NR you'll want to turn it off to get saturated sounds.
Ultimately just use your ears to determine the level of saturation you want... most of the tracks I ever recorded on my R8 were that hot (+8 light flashing). That machine has very nice electronics, it doesn't seem possible to get any bad-sounding clipping out of it. (The plastic transport is another story)
 
when I was first starting out in my teens, I had my handy school physics book, and I had my ears. My local library had a few books on electronics and one on recording studios that was a BBC manual and damn hard for me to understand. I soon learned what worked and what didn't and even found a brand of tape (Scotch) that worked best for me. I learned how far I could push the VU meters, and later on I even discovered how to adjust the bias to align the recorder (Ferrograph 722HD) with the handy manual I eventually could afford.

I even discovered how it responded to being connected to a loudspeaker output from my dad's new stereo. I never blew it up because the physics worked. I even discovered that the ferrograph, which had 10W amps in it - could drive the scan coils of a black and white TV set and produce great sic-fi (to my eyes back then) patterns.

Nowadays, the spirit of experimentation and self-learning has gone, which is rather sad. Indeed you could plug a loudspeaker output into a line input, and starting with the control on low on the music-centre, or other tape deck with no line out - and the tape recorder input on zero, it was perfectly possible to record pick of the pops at the weekend to get the latest music free. Back then copyright control was simply Tony Blackburn talking over the start and end of each track. We had a few electronics magazine, and then a few embryonic music mags, and then something called everyday electronics that showed you how to build fuzz boxes and was way pedals. They also taught you how they worked.

Now we just ask the net, and get back the usual stock answers that we always respond with. In fact, nowadays you usually get spec back
As long as you don't exceed XdB, and ensure the input impedance is lower than output impedance all will be ok etc etc
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I think I leaned more from mismatching and hearing the treble vanish, or the nasty distortion caused by pinning the meters to the stops than I did by reading. When I didn't have a fuzz box, I'd stick the guitar into a mic input (used jacks in those days) and deliberately crush the preamp creating distortion.

pdmillar is quite right about the R8 - very difficult to make it sound nasty. Sony cassette decks sounded very nasty, very easily.

Track width on the multitrack is very important too - the narrow multitrack sound quite different to the half track versions.

Give it a shot and that will let you set your own rules that work on your machine, with it's alignment.
 
rob aylestone said:
Give it a shot and that will let you set your own rules that work on your machine, with it's alignment.
Click to expand...

^^^^

This.

If you simply want a decently clean recording without distortion you're probably somewhere around the correct level.

If you want to use the onset of tape clipping/distortion as an effect, then you just have to experiment and set your own limits.

As is so often the case, this is one for ears, not numbers.
 
Just bear in mind that on something like an R8....the electronics will probably distort before the tape at high levels.
 
...

Also remember the LEDs are peak reading meters and are very fast, whereas a comparable RMS needle style VU meter would read a bit lower due to the mechanical limitation of it's ballistics.
:spank::eek:;)
 
There IS such a thing as bad sounding tape saturation. If you use a professional machine whose electronics are not distorting, but which is over-saturating the tape, there WILL come a point where the clipping will not only be noticeable, but it will sound as bad, if not worse, than digital clipping does.
 
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