Scotch tapes: what type, how good ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter david winter
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david winter

david winter

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Some time ago I bought a large number of reels from a former employee who worked at a french radio.

There is a number of 10.5" Scotch reels in white boxes (black Scotch labels). All appear to date circa 1975-1977. Neither the tape nor their boxes mention any tape type or thickness. The back of the boxes only show a table of duration according to reel size and recording speed.

The tapes are black (well, very close to) and are thinner than PER 525/528 (I think they are 35 microns thick but I'm not sure). They don't seem to develop stickiness (so far as I tested only a few reels).

What I need to know is:
- how good they are compared to Maxell XL35 or PER 525 / 528, especially for recording live concerts on radio (classical music only)
- how reliable they are (will they develop stickiness, which doesn't seem to be the case right now)
- whether I would rather record live performances on PER 528 (I have quite a lot 525/528) or XL35 (only 7" reels, few still full) ?


Thanks,

David.
 
Tape is ALWAYS an issue - heck it was an issue back in the early 80s when I was trying to become the next Alan Parsons heh. I had lots of issues with Scotch back in the day... I want to say it was 1978-79, but had some scotch 205 (I think) actually shedding the oxide completelty! I saw this from some 1980-81 TDK also - so no brand is immune it would seem.


AK
 
My limited experience with 3M was while I worked at a 24 track facility close to where I live. They used 226 exclusively and had great results with it, but your point is well taken. No brands are completely immune to problems. Back when Memorex was being hyped a lot I ran across one of their tapes with chunks of oxide missing - never used them since.
 
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