DIY

I don't know if they have them where you live but, here in Toronto, we have a school called Trebas Institute. They will teach you all about running a recording studio from mixing to producing to maintenance to business management. They have a job placement service and can at least get you apprentice work, where you work for free but learn in a real studio how to do many things including how to scrub a toilet and get coffee for the staff.

I am sure there are a raft of schools with similar programs.

Do Google searches

Look in phone books

Call up studios and volunteer to be a free slave. ( I'm serious! )

Good luck! :)

ps. We also dole out some service tips here too, from time to time! :D
 
Thanks....


I am not really interested in going to a full service recording school just yet. I was hoping there was just some place where they only teach how to fix and maintain this stuff. The conservatory is a nice place.....but it $12k.
 
Buy a book on basic electronics, and some broken units, and just get experience. I spent four years in college for a piece of paper saying I knew some stuff about electronics (BSEE). Then I got a job and realized I knew nothing. Practical experience is where you really learn.

I'm sure the reel machines are pretty basic, older technology (i.e. discrete resistors, capacitors, logic, etc.) With new digital stuff, it's a LOT harder to troubleshoot things when all the logic is packed onto a small piece of plastic with XILINX written on top.

You also might try finding a repair shop where you live, and getting to know the guys there and ask them questions.

It doesn't have to be open faced reels either. I bet cassette decks are technologically about the same. The key is knowing how they work. So when it stops working, you can figure out WHAT is not working.

Hopefully this helps. :D
 
Dethska said:
Practical experience is where you really learn.
Click to expand...

Amen to that ...

One thing, if you do have experience working with electronics (troubleshooting techniques, ability to read schematics, familiarity with certain circuit configurations, etc ), hopefully, you can dig up service manuals. The manufacturers of most of this equipment made some excellent service material - it's just a matter of finding it.
You may have to pay for it, you may not.

I borrowed an old Telefunken reel to reel when I was about 15, and the damn thing came with a service manual ! Lots of high end old equipment did in those days.
Good thing too, because the belts had rotted away, and there was no other way to find out what size they were...
 
I have no advice as to which direction to point you other than what's already been suggested, but I have to say I think it's pretty cool that you'd be interested in pursuing experience in that area be it as a practical hobby or even as a full fledged vocation. The (Perhaps) fleeting analog world certainly wouldn't be worse off having more repair guys that are really into it.
(Thrift shops are a great place to find old two track machines and all kinds of stuff to practice working on.)


GO CUBS
:)
 
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