Revox B77 find! Not what I expected.

[rob aylestone]

I have two reel to reels, a Tascam and A Revox A77 and today was clearing out the store with a colleague and opened a box to discover two forgotten about reel to reels. A B77: stereo slow speed recorder. 1 ⅞ ips and 3 ¾ ips stereo. It seems to have come from a radio station used as a logging recorder. Plus, unopened as yet what might be a Revox tube stereo machine. It weighs a ton, so will have to pull it out and see what is inside. No idea what i can use the B77 for but it is in great condition. Might be fun to put it up against the A77 and see if the difference is what history says it should be? Cassettes on their narrow tape can be pretty good so i wonder how a reel to reel will match up.

What do you think it will sound like? History tells me slow speed will be compromised HF and perhaps extra hiss? Time will tell. I’ll do my best to get the thing powered up and tested but its been a crazy week. I opened another flight case today and inside is an ETC EOS twin touchscreen lighting control, so that’s up for testing first I think. Sound wise, I’ve found an old record player, one of those with a huge horn on top. Donations to a historic lighting and sound collection a few friends have started. Amazing what we’ve had donated.

 

[TalismanRich]

At the station in college, we had an Ampex that ran 1 7/8IPS that we used for logs. I used to have a couple of tapes but they were lost when the basement flooded.

I don't recall the 1 7/8" tapes sounding all that bad, but we only had the 10" monitor on the wall and it wasn't exactly a HiFi setup. We were only doing AM, so you really only worked with a max of 8 or 10K.

 

[rob aylestone]

Well today I tried the B77 and at 3 ¾IPS it sounded pretty good, but I also uncovered an early 60s' Revox G36 and that sounds really good. I plugged it in and worried that maybe it would go pop, but it didn't. One knob was a bit crackly at first but it settled down nicely, and recorded with no bother. I'd forgotten the smell of hot tubes! This thing is nearly 60 years old and so far, I'm very impressed with the sound. Next week I'm getting the A77 back - so I can try recording on three consecutive models of Revox products. Best thing on the G36 was that the drive belts and brakes were perfect - needing no adjustments. In contrast, I plugged in my troublesome Tascam 34 and it's lost all output in the past 6 months since power up! I think I'm going to send it to a specialist - too much for me to do.