Question on dropouts

[famous beagle]

In y'all's experience, are dropouts usually caused mostly by the tape or the machine?

 

[sweetbeats]

In my experience it's either worn out tape, or crap getting on the heads. Which machine and is edge tracks or no tracks in particular?

 

[famous beagle]

I had some on track 1 with the 388, but it was with the new Pyral tape. I've tried several tests with some NOS Quantegy 457, and it's been rock solid so far.

I haven't tried all the tracks yet (I mean ... you know ... recording music), but I think I went 1-6 and only noticed it on track 1 with the Pyral tape. Also, I haven't tried other spots on that tape yet. I just recorded one 3.5-minute drum track, and there were some drop-outs in it.

 

[sweetbeats]

The Pyral is more precisely slit to the standard spec. The Quantegy (and the Ampex tape label that preceded it) was slit underspec because their slitters weren't as precise, and to avoid the risk of tape running too wide they slit more narrow than spec. We're talking thousands of an inch, but this is why there's frequently trouble on machines with no edge slots in the heads when switching between Quampex and pretty much any other tape. Your wear groove in the head is probably cut by Quantegy/Ampex tape and the Pyral is riding up on the edge, or rubbing at the edge and you are getting some edge shed. You can test this by playing back a known good passage of tape that is dropping out and apply slight pressure at the bottom edge of the tape. It'll set the tape in the groove at the bottom and the dropouts should cease. Also look for any edge shed.

 

[Bobbsy]

In my experience it's either worn out tape, or crap getting on the heads. Which machine and is edge tracks or no tracks in particular?

I'd agree with this except it's often a combination of the two. Old tape sheds oxide like mad...and that oxide clogs up the heads.

 

[famous beagle]

Cool, thanks for the info. That's interesting Cory about the 457. I wonder if that's what has happened. I ordered another reel of NOS 457, so we'll see how it goes.

 

[WarmJetGuitar]

I had dropff issues with RMGi tape after they changed their location to France, that is since Pyral took over from whatever factory in Holland. It was on 1/2" SM911 on my Fostex G16 that have never shown any issues with dropoffs.
So I'd suspect the tape, if you can try with a BASF/EMTEC/dutsch RMGI or some Quantegy or AGFA.

 

[famous beagle]

I had dropff issues with RMGi tape after they changed their location to France, that is since Pyral took over from whatever factory in Holland. It was on 1/2" SM911 on my Fostex G16 that have never shown any issues with dropoffs.
So I'd suspect the tape, if you can try with a BASF/EMTEC/dutsch RMGI or some Quantegy or AGFA.

Yeah, I haven't had any issues so far (cross fingers) with my reel of Quantegy 457. I just ordered another NOS reel off ebay ... actually for cheaper than I paid for the Pyral.

 

[Findlay]

I get sometimes get weird drop out effects with all my 244s. I always clean the heads and roller and use new,tape before recording but occasionally find I can get a severe (-10db or more) loss of signal partway through a track. It's usually only on track 1. I got used to recording my basic guitar on both tracks 1 and 2 in case this happened -if track 1 was duff I had track 2 to fall back on. I liked to get the rhythm on track 1 if possible as it was always easy enough to repeat this if needed and I didn't want a drop out on a lead guitar part I might never be able to reproduce! Thinking about this I wonder if dust gets down through the small gap in the lid to the cassette well ans causes it and that track 1 is the most prone. Maybe some tape over the gap might help.