Opinions on Tapes

T

Thrust

New member
Im moving my studio and stubled upona reel of Ampex 499 and a reel of Scotch 996 both reels are open and have been used and Im wondering do either of these formulatios usally suffer from sticky shed. Thanks in advance for any advice.
 
I use 499, but also have a bunch of the 3m 996...they both hold up very well. I've gone through reel after reel of used 499 tapes, and only found some light gunk on a few reels when doing my cleaning passes.
With the 996, I had maybe 1-2 reels that had some stickiness to them, bu not what I would consider true SSS.

Mostly the result of maybe non-ideal storage on a few of the reels before I got them...but otherwise both formulations appear to hold up well, and some of the used tapes I acquired are pretty old yet still good.
 
my experiences mirror Miroslav's (pardon the alliteration):
499: never a prob
996: mostly good (my fav stock, in fact), but I've encountered the odd slightly sticky reel
 
Yeah, I concur with what has been said. 499 used a different binder from the beginning when Ampex first introduced it, so no sticky-shed. In my experience it tends to shed a powdery oxide more than other tapes, but gets better with use. I don't use it now, but when I did I had to clean my tape path more often. All tapes shed a little oxide, some more than others. I've never seen a sticky-shed reel of 3M 996 either, but just high-normal oxide shedding. Quantegy GP9, which is based on 3M 996 is the cleanest running tape I know of.
 
I've been running the same 2" reel of 499 over and over and over and over on my MX80 the last couple of months now....just working on song ideas and even recording tracks for some keeper songs.
I wipe the heads and guides after each session....and nothing, clean cotton.
 
I have a few reels left of 6 year old GP9 that i have been using for everything because I hate paying the current price of half inch. My machine is biased for 456 but I get a bright clean semi digital sound out of it by recording at 3 above 0db And its sooooooo quiet.
 
I use a lot of 3M996. It's not sticky per se, but it does shed a lot of oxide. You need to clean the heads frequently. I was setting up a Tascam 22 for some Maxell UD I bought. I forgot I had recently listened to a recording from a roll of 996 on that deck. Put the MRL tape on the 22 and started freaking out when I saw the meters dropping 8-10db on tones above 4khz. Thought something in the deck went FUBAR. Took me a minute to remember to check the heads. They were caked up with oxide after the 996. Wipes right off though - no sticky.

I know...clean the heads first next time.
 
Ironically, I just opened a new reel of 996 that started squealing.

Rewind, clean the heads, etc. it begins to play fine. Still a PITA.

Has anyone had luck baking 996?
 
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