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Vintage Tape (Audio), Cassette, Wire and Magnetic Disc Recorders and Players Open-reel tape recorders, cassette recorders, 8-track players etc.

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Old 27th Sep 2020, 11:20 pm   #1
m0cemdave
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Default Just an old block of worn heads

Here's one especially for Ted, James and Tim.

I came across this today. Any comments?
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Old 27th Sep 2020, 11:31 pm   #2
Ted Kendall
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

Interesting...it looks like something from a Magnetophon or Telefunken T9, certainly an oxide-out deck. Could be as early as the 1940s or as recent as the 1960s, though the erase head isn't ferrite, which was adopted by 1960-odd. Full track mono.

Last edited by Ted Kendall; 27th Sep 2020 at 11:41 pm.
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Old 28th Sep 2020, 12:08 am   #3
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

Blimey, that looks like the exact head they used in the 1950s Scotch tape cobblers/blurb about the terrible consequences of not using their lubricated tapes!
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Old 28th Sep 2020, 12:09 am   #4
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

I know exactly what it is, and was gobsmacked when I found it. Not my own unfortunately. This was with it:
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Old 28th Sep 2020, 12:35 am   #5
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

Teac 301?
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Old 28th Sep 2020, 7:30 am   #6
Ted Kendall
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

Quote:
Originally Posted by m0cemdave View Post
I know exactly what it is, and was gobsmacked when I found it. Not my own unfortunately. This was with it:
That is a Magnetophon, surely? Or maybe a Tonschreiber? That second object could the replay head drum. It's certainly oxide-out, which rules out anything American past the Ampex 200, or Japanese for that matter. It's the wrong colour for a BTR1. I haven't seen an RGD or Motosacoche in the flesh, but other than those it has to be early German.

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Old 28th Sep 2020, 10:24 am   #7
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

Tonschreiber.

https://www.vintagerecorders.co.uk/V...age.asp?IDS=59

Is the headblock with the rest of the machine?... It`s just that my Dad told me that (as a REME chap) he went to an exhibition of captured German equipment, just after the end of the war and they had a Tonschreiber that they were going to demonstrate but then found that someone had nicked the headblock......
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Old 29th Sep 2020, 5:44 am   #8
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

That erase head looks massive, I wonder what the reason for those enormous pole pieces is, and asymmetric at that, or is it just that it's big in order to handle the erase current?
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Old 2nd Oct 2020, 7:27 pm   #9
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

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Originally Posted by barrymagrec View Post
Tonschreiber.

https://www.vintagerecorders.co.uk/V...age.asp?IDS=59

Is the headblock with the rest of the machine?... It`s just that my Dad told me that (as a REME chap) he went to an exhibition of captured German equipment, just after the end of the war and they had a Tonschreiber that they were going to demonstrate but then found that someone had nicked the headblock......
Haha, maybe this is the one...

These heads were buried in a box of old teleprinter parts in the stores at TNMOC. Now rescued, and will probably go on display although they are somewhat outside the museum's direct interests.

Some more pictures:
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Old 2nd Oct 2020, 7:37 pm   #10
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

This is the rotary head, which would have been plugged into a turntable. It has four gaps at 90 degrees like an early video head. It is difficult to photograph but two of the gaps are just visible in the last picture.
Spinning the head allowed a recording to be played back at variable speed whilst maintaining pitch. Useful for high speed (burst type) morse code messages or, presumably, time-compressing recordings.
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Old 2nd Oct 2020, 10:41 pm   #11
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

It is interesting that the rotary head works in a way analogous to the early digital pitch shifters which just took a chunk of audio, played it at a different speed and repeated or removed sections as required.
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Old 3rd Oct 2020, 12:21 am   #12
Ted Kendall
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

This was the basis of a commercial pitch shift unit which was used in parts of the Decca recording of Wagner's Goetterdaemmerung,to disguise a singer's voice for dramatic effect.
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Old 4th Oct 2020, 6:46 am   #13
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

Impressive, I've never seen any of those rotating heads, just read about them.

I would assume that such a pitch shifting method would cause rather a stuttering effect on short sounds?

On the other hand, the tape would be approaching and leaving the head on a tangent meaning that there would be a somewhat gradual attack and decay of the signal at the start and end of the individual pass of each individual playback gap, which I'm assuming would lessen the effect to some degree.
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Old 4th Oct 2020, 7:35 am   #14
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Default Re: Just an old block of worn heads

The original use of the Tonschreiber was to transmit and receive time-compressed Morse messages, particularly from U-boats, where the allied HF/DF system (known, inevitably, as "Huff Duff") was able to get a range and bearing on the shortest of transmissions. The slurring effect on discrete dots and dashes would have been minimal.
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