Confused about "pancakes"

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steamshooter

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I'm shopping for tape. How do you handle pancakes? I use the 7" reel. How do I avoid a bowl of spaghetti transferring the pancake to 7" reels? Should I just avoid pancakes altogether?

Thanks
Brad
 
These are pretty darn good, and healthy too.

Whole Wheat Pancakes

1 cup whole wheat flour
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup wheat germ
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon salt
5 1/3 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 1/2 cups buttermilk
2 eggs, beaten
3 tablespoons unsalted butter

Directions
1 In a food processor or in a large bowl, combine the whole wheat flour, white flour, wheat germ or oats, baking powder, baking soda, brown sugar, and salt.
2 Cut the butter into small pieces with a knife, and add the butter to the flour-mixture. Mix until the mixture has a sand-like consistency.
3 Make a well in the center of the flour-butter mixture, and add the buttermilk and eggs. Stir until the liquids are fully incorporated.
4 Heat a frying pan over medium heat and grease the surface with 1 tablespoon of butter or oil.
Ladle the batter onto the surface to form 4 inch pancakes. Once bubbles form on the top of the
pancakes, flip them over, and cook them on the other side for about 2 minutes.
 
Actually, handling tape pancakes isn't as hard as you'd think. But to transfer it easily to a reel, you'd need to have at least one flange, and I don't think I've seen those smaller than 10 1/2".
 
VTgreen81, I knew I set myself up for that after I posted it. :D

What excactly is a flange? It's been eons since I had any dealings with anything larger than 7" reels. The last time I was around one there was a thick white cloud of organic smoke in the air. :cool: Would I not just need a 10 1/2" reel to put the pancake in and something like a movie film editer to wind onto the 7" ? Is this getting to complicated to be practical?
Maybe I'll just go down to St. Alfonzo's and order butter and syrup with it.
Brad
 
What exactly is a flange?
A flange is the round, outer protective circles that attach to the hub and the hub is what the tape winds onto and off of.

10.5" large reels generally have the flanges made out of aluminum metal and often have cool brand name stickers from the tape manufacturers.

A pancake of tape is just the tape and the hub, minus the flanges.

Cheers! :)
 
steamshooter said:
I'm shopping for tape. How do you handle pancakes? I use the 7" reel. How do I avoid a bowl of spaghetti transferring the pancake to 7" reels? Should I just avoid pancakes altogether?

Thanks
Brad

Pancakes can be a good deal if you don't make it too hard on yourself. I buy pancakes to replace wornout tape on otherwise good metal reels.

If I understand your objective here, you need to get a pair of metal reel flanges from US Recording Media -- three screws and you're done. Now you can mount the two tapes side by side on the machine and fill the 7" with whatever you need.

:cool:
 
Still confused

The hub is the black center I see in a picture of a pancake. Correct? This is included with the pancake.

http://store1.yimg.com/I/usrecordingmedia-store_1811_11837035

The reel is split to allow the tape and hub to go in the center, then re-assembled around the tape hub. Correct?

Are the terms flange and reel interchangeable? :confused:
Is this a flange or a reel?
http://store1.yimg.com/I/usrecordingmedia-store_1811_8842369


I don't have a deck that will take 10 1/2" reels. In my mind's eye, I'm picturing a stand that would hold the 10 1/2" reel beside a deck to feed the tape onto the 7" reel. Let the deck's motor do the work. Then rewind after the tape is cut to make sure it's centered in the reel.

Thanks for your patience
Brad
 
Brad,

If you only have a machine that can hold 7" reels, do yourself a favor and simply buy normal reels of blank tape which consist of the the hub, the tape itself and the outer flanges that have already been described above in my previous post.

Rigging up external gizmos to load larger 10.5" pancakes of tape may be a novel project to try out for fun but I don't see it as an elegant solution.

Why are you even wanting to do this in the first place? Is it simply to save a couple of bucks over the price of a normal reel of tape? Not that I haven't been known to jump through unusual hoops to save a buck or two! :D But as I get older and marginally wiser, I also take convenience or the lack of it now into the price factor when shopping for goods and services.

Cheers! :)
 
The Ghost of FM said:
Brad,

Why are you even wanting to do this in the first place? Is it simply to save a couple of bucks over the price of a normal reel of tape? Not that I haven't been known to jump through unusual hoops to save a buck or two! :D But as I get older and marginally wiser, I also take convenience or the lack of it now into the price factor when shopping for goods and services.

Cheers! :)

You hit the nail on the head. I have a tendency to be cheeeep. The more I look at my plan, the more I think it will go on the back burner. If I ever get to the point of needing gobs of tape I will go back to it. Thanks for pointing it out. I've still got lots to learn.

Brad
 
steamshooter said:
You hit the nail on the head. I have a tendency to be cheeeep. The more I look at my plan, the more I think it will go on the back burner. If I ever get to the point of needing gobs of tape I will go back to it. Thanks for pointing it out. I've still got lots to learn.

Brad


As much as I like to tinker and experiment, sometimes I can waste way too much time, money and trips to the store on projects such as you describe.

I've learned (the hard way) to start with the right tool for the job right out of the gate so I can spend more time on what I'm here for in the first place -- making music.

:cool:
 
What can I say? I admit it. I'm a piddler and a pack rat. I tend to overcomplicate things while I'm trying to simplify them. I think it's inherited. Thanks again for all the advice. :D
Brad
 
There was a gentleman who contacted me with the same question last year.
He had a 10-1/2 inch machine that didn't work and bought a 7 inch machine that was working but were not able to play the bigger reels. :confused:
So after a couple of e-mails back and fourth, he disabled the brakes on the big Teac so the left reel were spinning freely with a loaded 10-1/2 inch reel mounted and his 7 inch Sony stacked on phone-books to reach the same height as the Teac.
Running the tape from the Tascam to the Sony take-up reel using fforward at the same time :eek:
He told me that it kind of worked...problem was when hitting stop on the Sony and the big reel kept on spinning on the Teac... :p
But after some splices and *#(@*@ all tapes were on 7 inch's reels instead.
I would not suggest this Brad..
Buy regular 7 inch instead and enjoy the music :cool:
 
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