NAGRA Mono Reel2Reel Needs Help!!

[beaudiolab]

last week a friend of mine brought a black box which was found near an alien spaceship in Swiss! just kiddin he gave me a Nagra SNS a mono micro reel recorder, any guys here have any ideas what this thing is good for??? it has a superb mic with 5 pin connector which i never saw in my life (NAGRASTATIC is the mic) and 2 pairs of wires that seem useless I heard this THING was used in film projects, thats all i know

 

[jpmorris]

The SN series are basically covert recorders. In filmmaking you would put it in a plant pot or something so that it can record the dialogue of the actors nearby. They are I believe still used by intelligence agencies for spying.

What would you use it for? I don't know. If I had one, it would probably be more for the intrinsic beauty of its design than for anything really practical.

 

[Cosmic]

The Mini Nagras came in at least 3 versions, including stereo ones.
Hang on to it for the beauty of it. It is wildly impractical, but an amazing piece of engineering.

I have seen spare tapes and reels on EBay for it occationally, so one can still use it to get people's jaws to hit the floor when you pull it out and thread it up.
Gotta love the manual rewind crank too

Best,
C.

 

[Tim Gillett]

They used to be worn on the body but they were superceded as wireless microphones got so much better.
For film work the larger Nagras were still used as there was no need for such miniaturisation and the compromises of such a tiny design. The SN's used cassette width tape on tiny open reels.

Lovely machine. You'd never have problems finding a buyer.

Tim

 

[beaudiolab]

as I assumed, SNS is more like a masterpiece of engineering (esp. Manual Rewind!!) beauty in design BUT non-practical and sentimental novelty piece for sound engineering oldies collectors?!