Do You Clean the ADAT Heads Yourself?

Tom Hicks

Tom Hicks

Well-known member
I've had an ADAT HD24 for a couple years now. Great bit of gear! My brother just bought an HD24 for himself this week. He is selling me one of his ADAT XTs, which I plan to use for remote recordings and weekly rehearsals of my rock band. He told me the XT has just recently been serviced, but my understanding is that the heads will eventually need routine maintanance every 250 drum hours or so.
How delicate is the head cleaning procedure? Do any of you guys do the head cleaning yourself, or would that task be better left to the service techs? What's a fair service charge for that task? Thanks in advance.
 
cleaning adats is not impossible but if ya have to ask i'ldstay with a tech... it is kinda sensitive to lateral forces... should take about a 1/2hr of time...
 
It's not hard to learn but you would want to get it right. With the Alesis video, and after a few sessions with the cover off it ain't bad.
My fave pet trick' is after it eats a tape and it smears grease from the roller bearings up into the tape path.. :p
When you see it it's amazing the thing works at all.
 
I'd just keep backup copies of everything you do, and if and when you start running into errors that suggest the heads need cleaning (the Blackface units also showed error correction as it occured by a flashing '.' (dot) in the tape counter), don't lift the hood - particularly if it's been serviced professionally recently anyway.

In my experience with Adats, tape quality is absolutely critical; you must use a good tape or it gets eaten.*

The main thing to look out for when cleaning is sideways pressure (use as little as possible (and you really shouldn't need much), and avoid the 4 slots where the actual 'heads' are embedded, as they will snag and break pretty easily.

I'm no expert, but I cleaned the heads myself and never had a problem.

* Here in Japan, the currently recommended tape for Adats - since a lot of the Adat spec'd ones are no longer made - turned out to be an off-the-shelf Maxell (FD-240 or something, it's been a while). I was wary that it wasn't an esoterically priced tape, but all the ones I used performed flawlessly.
 
I have cleaned old fashioned tape deck heads many a time, but never one of these helical scan rotary jobs. Eddie Ciletti's website suggest the heads are sensitive to being moved out of allignment. What's a fair price for a head cleaning from a certified tech?
 
Many thanks for the input guys. I think I'll be brave and careful enough to do the head cleaning. Lint free cloth, 90% isopropral alcohol and holding the cloth still while rotating the head counter-clockwise seems to be the drill.
 
Just an update and thanks for all the input. The ADAT XT I bought from my brother in FL arrived via FEDEX last Thursday. Turns out to be an XT20 with super low hours. As soon as the 4 space gator shallow rack I ordered arrives, I'll be using the XT20 for location recording with my band on club dates. Anybody know if I need to use proprietary alesis sync cable to connect to my HD24 or will any regular 9 pin D sub cable work?
 
Regular 9 pin works between 2 ADAT's for me- despite having been told many times that it doesn't work.

I also didn't use the 2 machines that way long enough to run into any problems that might have turned up. (shrug)

Take care,
Chris
 
Tom Hicks said:
I've had an ADAT HD24 for a couple years now. Great bit of gear! My brother just bought an HD24 for himself this week. He is selling me one of his ADAT XTs, which I plan to use for remote recordings and weekly rehearsals of my rock band. He told me the XT has just recently been serviced, but my understanding is that the heads will eventually need routine maintanance every 250 drum hours or so.
How delicate is the head cleaning procedure? Do any of you guys do the head cleaning yourself, or would that task be better left to the service techs? What's a fair service charge for that task? Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

I used to service VCR's for extra money, and while I haven't tried to service my ADAT's yet I'm sure the procedure is the same. VCR's required the use of chamois swabs (NOT Q tips, as they can snag the head where it protrudes from the drum) and a zero residue cleaner. The important thing is to wipe ACROSS the head, not up and down.
 
cleaning adat head is extremly easy. Just open it up, get 99.0% alcohol, not the 70% shit. With a cuetip slowly wipe a alcohol dampened cuetip over the recording drum in the direction it turns. Dont push hard,be easy on it. Let it dry for 10 minutes ,close it up. The other thing is idler wheels, they gobad, get worn, but they are simple to replace and cheap.
Jim
 
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