[ricard]

Also, I would add that the drag from the counter is (should be) much less than the friction between the turntable its felt ring and the underlying plastic disk. There's not a lot of back tension on this machine, just enough to keep the tape form lifting from the erase head. The pressure pad at the record/playback head holds the tape firmly in place at this crucial point.

Some slightly later Philips machines, I know the EL3547 does it this way, have a small spring loaded pad at the left guide pin, and no back tension at all on the reel tables. Yet the counter still operates from the left hand turntable, and there's no discernible drag from it.

Which puts me in mind - it seems that this way of using vertically arranged clutch mechanisms with felt rings on the turntables engaging with stationary or spinning disks was more typical of 1950s construction that later designs. I don't know if it is the fact that these machines can be hard to set up regarding the actual tension induced, or that later designs attempt to be more compact vertically. Tandberg is one manufacturer that kept using the vertical clutch arrangement for the longest time, but other manufacturers seemed to move towards having rubber idlers engaging against the reel tables to provide various functions.