UK Vintage Radio Repair and Restoration Discussion Forum - View Single Post - Sound Belle reel-to-reel heads

jmcilkley · 18th Oct 2020, 10:39 am

Presumably without a capstan the tape speed will vary as the diameter of tape on the right hand spool changes. This would make it impossible to play a tape from another machine that did use a capstan for constant tape speed. An unusual design!
Checking the signal at the record/playback head, when set to record it looks fine with the bias at about 47kHz. Similarly the erase head shows the right signal. So it seems that the tape recorder is certainly working as far as the r/p head. The tape head does show a reasonable resistance of about 230 ohms so I think I now have to find a way of sending a magnetic signal through the head to see if that gets through or finding a bit of tape that I'm sure has something on.
My model also has Daly and ERO capacitors so it sounds like the same model and probably UK made. Surprisingly, the capacitors test out as still withing spec but I will be replacing them once I can sort out the R/P head.
Apologies if I seem a bit clueless but this is the first time I've worked on a tape recorder. Record players and amplifiers have been more my thing up to now but this seemed like a challenge.

18th Oct 2020, 10:39 am	#11
jmcilkley Tetrode Join Date: Jan 2020 Location: Ilkley, West Yorkshire, UK. Posts: 92	Re: Sound Belle reel-to-reel heads Presumably without a capstan the tape speed will vary as the diameter of tape on the right hand spool changes. This would make it impossible to play a tape from another machine that did use a capstan for constant tape speed. An unusual design! Checking the signal at the record/playback head, when set to record it looks fine with the bias at about 47kHz. Similarly the erase head shows the right signal. So it seems that the tape recorder is certainly working as far as the r/p head. The tape head does show a reasonable resistance of about 230 ohms so I think I now have to find a way of sending a magnetic signal through the head to see if that gets through or finding a bit of tape that I'm sure has something on. My model also has Daly and ERO capacitors so it sounds like the same model and probably UK made. Surprisingly, the capacitors test out as still withing spec but I will be replacing them once I can sort out the R/P head. Apologies if I seem a bit clueless but this is the first time I've worked on a tape recorder. Record players and amplifiers have been more my thing up to now but this seemed like a challenge.