Hey Tape Guys - Who's Looking For Used Metal?

[J!m]

Technically, not polished, but callendared. (Which may be spelled wrong?)

Callendar rolls are highly polished hard rolls (you cannot eat them) that flatten the coating after it is applied to the tape.

Better manufacturers did it at least twice and their tape is smooth and shiny on the head side. In fact, often shinier on the coated side than the uncoated side.

Sony, TDK and Maxell all did a nice job. Others did too but I haven’t used them all! If I find a new (old) tape I wind it out and have a look. I check for wrinkles and creases but also the surface finish of the tape itself.

Another useful bit- softer abrasives can be more aggressive than hard ones. Stone grinding wheels work best when the wheel is being consumed (wearing) during the grinding. So, those “soft” ferric oxide tapes can be much more aggressive than Cobalt and Chromium formulations due to surface finish.

And no, you don’t ever get back that minute of life you wasted reading that.

 

[Elite-ist]

Hi Jerry:

I am interested in these:

6 or thereabouts Sony UCX-90
2 Sony UCX-S 90's
6 RS MPX Metals, various lengths and editions

And the Sony Metal Master and Phoenix Type IIs.

Nando.

 

[vince666]

Technically, not polished, but callendared. (Which may be spelled wrong?)

Callendar rolls are highly polished hard rolls (you cannot eat them) that flatten the coating after it is applied to the tape.

Yes, exactly that. The calendering process (calandratura in italian).

I've preferred to say "polished" because I had assumed that "calendered" was a less easy way to get what I meant.
So, calendering is something which makes the surface appearing more polished or, better said, more smooth.

Regarding tapes with less calendering and, then, a rougher surface I happen to have and see certain Type2 tapes produced in Korea during the "later" years... those show a less smooth surface and I noticed they can add some visible damage to the heads just after playing one side of a cassette... at least on those heads which are made of less hard material like permalloy, but someone reported similarly quick damage occurring also on amorphous heads.

There is a very long thread about these "head grinding" tapes there at the other place where I happened to share a few pictures.

example of a type2 (ferric-cobalt) tape with a quite nasty surface... picture was taken under a strong light with my smartphone camera zoomed at 6X and while making the light mirroring/reflecting on the tape surface (otherwise it would look nice on the camera)... while, at naked eye, it's maybe a bit easier to spot the issue.
Of course, while zooming by 6X and with the trick of the strong light mirroring on the tape surface, quite any tapes out there will show some degree of grainy/rough surface but on this nasty tape the surface is noticeably rougher (i.e. like some sandpaper with coarser grit, compared to sandpaper with finer grit) and, most of all, it's visibly "bumpy" while, on the safe tapes, is definitely more regular.



and, here below, a few picture of a permalloy head before playing this above cassette.



here below, a pic of the same head after playing only one side of the above cassette (where I also marked the most visible damage with a red arrow).




and here below the same head after playing also the other side of the same above cassette...



Don't know if the pics of the head are just easy to see but, in this case, the damage I am meaning looks like some holes/pits on the head surface and which weren't there before playing this tape.

Most likely, a few here will easily remember these pictures after seeing them again.

This tape with the nasty surface is a FUJI DR-II from the later years... most likely produced in South Korea and, evidently, not much calendered.
Actually, I still didn't happen to see any tapes made during the good older days with such a nasty surface, but only from the later years (say, from the late 90's and on) when most likely producers were going cheaper and/or getting the tape from places like South Korea or maybe even China.

 

[vince666]

That said, I don't want for you to become too paranoid about this... just, give a good look at tape surface when you happen to get some tapes you didn't just know before.

And, anyways, reading the list of tapes offered by jbeckva here, I just don't see anything which I would rate as being dangerous for the heads.

 

[MarkWComer]

@vince666
Thanks- and they weren't wasted minutes and I don't want them back...
Valuable information!

 

[MarkWComer]

Coercivity... Retentivity...

Here's a question- with metal formulations, I guess the recording level can hit +8db peaks with no difficulty, correct? Please remember- I'm returning to tape recording after a long hiatus, so there's a lot of things I don't remember. The point of "metal" tapes was the huge gauss levels it took to make an imprint on the particles, and subsequently, were also more difficult to erase- is this correct?

I also remember an artifact called "print through," where the magnetic patterns of one layer of tape influenced subsequent layers as the tape spooled, causing a pre- or post- echo. With higher coercivity I would think that this effect is greatly reduced, and affected standard ferrous tapes to a greater extent. As I recall, I had a few 3600' 7" reels with extremely thin substrate that exhibited this effect, probably from reaching saturation during high peak recording levels.

My inquisitive nature is often a pain in the ass to some people...

 

[20tajk7]

That said, I don't want for you to become too paranoid about this... just, give a good look at tape surface when you happen to get some tapes you didn't just know before.

And, anyways, reading the list of tapes offered by jbeckva here, I just don't see anything which I would rate as being dangerous for the heads.

Yes and the TDK MA's are from before 1990 which is good, far less risks of having one with the infamous white dust.

 

[vince666]

I believe you are right on quite every point there, Mark.

Very high coercivity of metal tapes makes them more difficult to record (they need a lot more bias current) and also to erase and I believe that print through is totally absent on these.

Just... even if these tapes can take very high recording levels, there are many decks (including several 3 heads ones) which aren't able to push the metals to their own limits (meaning the high levels on bass and mid-bass). But, even in these cases, they still keep the advantage of being able to take more treble than other formulations.... so, if the music to be recorded has very strong treble, a metal particle tape will do the trick wonderfully.
Of course, also the metal particle tapes for type2 position (i.e. Denon HD8, TDK HX-S, That's EX / EM-X / CD-MH) , even if they usually have lower MOL on bass and mid-bass compared to a proper type4, they still can deal with strong treble just as nicely.

About the "inability" of many decks of exploiting the very high recording levels of metal tapes, to my experience, one of the main factors is the heads, followed by how the recording electronics are actually arranged (which is something depending also on the actual kind of heads, btw).

And a side note about the levels on deck's meters...
To my knowledge, there are at least 3 different "scales" around... then the actual numbers on the peak meters (i.e. 0dB , +2dB , etc...) have different magnetic flux level depending on the actual reference of choice for the 0dB on a given deck/meter... The only level which is suppoused to be the same on all cassette decks is the dolby reference level (dolby mark on the meters)... some decks have dolby mark around -1dB , others have dolby mark at +4dB, others have just the 0dB as the dolby mark/reference... but it's not the dolby level which is moving between decks (otherwise dolby compatibility would be just impossible between different decks), it's the dB numbers which actually are different.
So, to really give it's true meaning to a certain level (say, that +8dB you mentioned there) , we should also mention which is the actual scale/reference of the deck... example, a level of +2dB on my Sony TC-K750ES (which has dolby mark around -1dB) is basicly equal to +6dB on my Pioneer CT-737markII (which has dolby mark around +3dB)... in both of these cases, it's maybe easier to simply say "3dB over the dolby mark" which is true for both decks regardless of which actual scale they use on the meters.
Having many decks here, with all these 3 kinds of different scales on meters, I was just forced to learn about this matter.

Cheers,

Vince.

 

[vince666]

Yes and the TDK MA's are from before 1990 which is good, far less risks of having one with the infamous white dust.

exactly!

not that I own just any versions of TDK MA here... but my (made in Germany) MA from 1990-91 are all with that white dust, none excluded... while I have some other MA from 1979-81 vintage, from 1982-83 vintage and also a MA-X from mid-late 80's (it just has large window) and all of them are fine... but I have also a few later ones (mid to late 90's, IIRC) and they are also fine on this.

And the ones offered here are from mid 80's (last version with small window?) then they are just well within the safe era.

 

[jbeckva]

LOL thread poopin is a Phoenix trademark..(no sweat guys)..

Anywhoo.. package out to Mark.. Derek you have a PM, and Nando.. you're next.

 

[vince666]

Hey, but I am a true specialist of thread poopin since forever... it's just my own genuine nature like this, I can't just avoid doing that.

So, Phoenix is definitely THE BEST place also for me, doesn't it?

 

[laatsch55]

Ahhhh, a true brother in spirit...

 

[MarkWComer]

LOL thread poopin is a Phoenix trademark..(no sweat guys)..

Anywhoo.. package out to Mark.. Derek you have a PM, and Nando.. you're next.

Thread pooping really pissed me off at first, but these are conversations, and conversations wander like Alice’s rabbit holes. Keeps things interesting, lifelike.

Thanks- got the tracking number, eyeballs peeled, even started making J-cards for planned tapes.

 

[jbeckva]

Thread pooping really pissed me off at first, but these are conversations, and conversations wander like Alice’s rabbit holes. Keeps things interesting, lifelike.

Thanks- got the tracking number, eyeballs peeled, even started making J-cards for planned tapes.

Sounds good, Mark. But yeah I also do encourage some listening to what might be on them. You just never know what you might discover LOL!

 

[20tajk7]

That's the fun part of getting used tapes, sometimes you have nice surprises.
I have a large box of "I like this music but I don't know what is it"

 

[vince666]

Mark, my "secret" while thread pooping is to always try adding interesting/useful stuff.
Doing this way, even at those places where thread pooping is NOT allowed at all, mods were always forced to make the hard choice of applying "the rules" just strictly and remove useful informations or to accept my pooping without complaining.... moreover, i used to clearly say i had added some off topic stuff and to balance my posts i also used to add a small (often useless) thing but which was just in topic.
Doing so, i made thread pooping for years while staying perfectly safe. LOL

Leo, for those "i like it but don't know what it is" tapes, i often solved with shazam.

 

[J!m]

Some state of the art threadcrapping right there.

 

[MarkWComer]

That's the fun part of getting used tapes, sometimes you have nice surprises.
I have a large box of "I like this music but I don't know what is it"

I might just feed them into Audacity and make digital copies, but if I find Lou Reed’s “Metal Machine Music” on one, it will head directly to the bulk eraser…

 

[vince666]

but if I find Lou Reed’s “Metal Machine Music” on one, it will head directly to the bulk eraser…

LOL... then you'd try out "Rainbow Dome Musick" by Steve Hillage, an early example of ambient/drone music and a bit easier to listen to than Metal Machine Music.
Happened to buy this Steve Hillage vinyl a few years ago and I am not even sure I've ever listened to it entirely.

 

[MarkWComer]

LOL... then you'd try out "Rainbow Dome Musick" by Steve Hillage, an early example of ambient/drone music and a bit easier to listen to than Metal Machine Music.
Happened to buy this Steve Hillage vinyl a few years ago and I am not even sure I've ever listened to it entirely.

Already in my LP collection! Good album. This is my second copy, the first was on transparent vinyl.