Akai 1720L, Marconiphone 4218, Fidelity Playmaster.
 

Recently got the above tape recorders,
The very tidy Akai bought first seemed ok and played ok without any internal mess plus plays and sounds nice. nothing came with it apart from the front cover.

The Fidelity shed was second that had seized up pivots and dodgy switches and volume and tone controls, so freed up all the pivots sprayed servisol on electrical bits and it plays ok now for a valve shed:) (mucky and rusty) came with tape, reels mic and a lead (only bought it for the tape to play on the Akai).

The also very tidy Marconi had a lazy start with lots of tape on left reel, not much tape on right reel rewind, ok if it had a run up but if restarted it needed help to get going
After a bit of faffing about it seems ok plus it plays and sounds nice, came with tape, reels, 2 mics but no stands and a remote pause button and some other cables and the lid (some cables have reacted with some of the plastic it seems.
There are functions on this one that I'm unfamiliar with anyone got a user manual for the Marconi

I haven't tried recording on on any of them yet.
Jon

Re: Akai 1720L, Marconiphone 4218, Fidelity Playmaster.
 

The Marconi service sheet is available from this site for £1.99 - see top of page RHS. It's a nice machine with a good playback sound.

The Fidelity is the most basic. As it has just the one one motor, Fast Forward and Rewind speed may vary depending on how much tape is on each reel.

There is much advice and info that you can google search out on that Akai.

Be careful of tape shed from the original tapes. Let us know how you get in with testing the recording capabilites of these. Clean the heads first with IPA.

Re: Akai 1720L, Marconiphone 4218, Fidelity Playmaster.
 

To avoid confusion, please start separate threads for each of the recorders you would like to discuss further.

Re: Akai 1720L, Marconiphone 4218, Fidelity Playmaster.
 

Hi Edward
The Fidelity is a very basic mono deck, I only bought it for the tape the full thing was only £3.
I bought the Akai at the local second hand market then went over to the Rochdale radio rally, where I bought the Fidelity for £3 with tape.

Didn't think I'd get it to work, but I was bored so I just plugged it in blocked my ears and turned it on ;D

I haven't seen any flaking so far I've been buying tapes when I see them for £1
I like listening to old 70's radio 1 pop, but so far only the Fidelity's tape had that on it.

The Marconi came from the same market.

Jon