Teac 80-8 running at the right speed?

L

LToro

New member
Is there a way to tell if my reel to reel is running at the correct speed
of fifteen inches per second? I recently send my tape machine to get
serviced, all good, but now old tapes sound pitch slow. Sorry about my English I am not
a native speaker. Anybody know a way to tell if my machine is running
at 15ips? I am sure someone here knows. Thanks for reading and I hope his makes any sense :)
 
Almost 100 views and no response? Some one help me please.
Maybe I can make a tape loop 30 inches long, record a sound and see how long it takes for the loop to come around :) It should make a two second loop.
 
Unfortunately unless you have a test tape with tone on it there is no way of checking exactly. I would think that the service centre had a test tape and set up the speed and your old recordings were recorded with the machine at the wrong speed. Ask the service centre if they did adjust the speed.

This is why back in the old days there was often a test tone recorded at the start of every tape so the speed could be checked and adjusted to suit the recorded tape. Does the 80-8 have a pitch adjustment? This could be used to fine tune the speed if it has.

Cheers
Alan.
 
Thanks Alan

I am going to ask the service centre. Yes makes sense to record
a test tone at the beginning of evey tape! I am going to do this for
now on. I am afraid there's no pitch control on the Teac 80-8 but what
a great machine this is! I already made a cool recording 12 piece Latin Afro
Beat band < lol recorded in a dirty basement in Brooklyn NY. Will see.
 
Doesn't the 80-8 have a synchronous capstan? If it doesn't have the varispeed mod, it should be controlled by the mains frequency (50/60Hz), and I don't think it's possible to alter it. Though if the pinch roller is slipping slightly, you could end up with a slight drop in speed.
 
jpmorris said:
Doesn't the 80-8 have a synchronous capstan? If it doesn't have the varispeed mod, it should be controlled by the mains frequency (50/60Hz), and I don't think it's possible to alter it. Though if the pinch roller is slipping slightly, you could end up with a slight drop in speed.
Click to expand...

I think that even with a synchronous motor there may be an internal speed adjustment, I may be wrong there. If the pinch roller was slipping it would translate to bad wow and flutter (a flanging effect) as it would not be constant.

Just a thought, was the machine set to the wrong hz setting and the service guys corrected it? Would be about 17% out. You may be able to select the old setting to play the older recordings?

Alan.
 
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