I remember how significantly the use of reel-to-reel tapes in the production room decreased from about 1999 to about 2003 at CBS. I'm wondering if anyone still uses them for anything, personally or professionally. Also, if you were designing a radio station production studio today, and you had a reasonable but not elaborate budget to work with, would you buy a reel-to-reel machine?

Not now in any broadcast scenario I could imagine would anyone use a reel to reel tape machine. Only the old timers would know how to edit correctly with it first of all. I am surprised that any CBS facility was still using reel to reel electromagnetic tape machines even in 1999! We had our Scullys in the production room till about 2001 but they hadnt been used for much since about 1997-98 when I had to dub off Westwood One barter spots for playback in the Audio-Prophet Wizard automation system. And I am out in the hinter markets in Eastern Wa.

Digital editing is much better quality, less expensive than installing and maintaining electromechanical tape machines and purchasing the tape for it to say nothing of training staff members in the art of something that is more like driving a 1918 Model T Ford.

The only reason I can think of still having a reel to reel is to transfer from analogue to digital.

My example is I had a chance to interview Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul and Mary back in college for my campus radio station in Spokane. My dad across that interview recently and I borrowed his very old mono 7.5ips only reel to reel to transfer it to digital.

I can't count the number of reels in my closet that I want to digitize...I'll probably have to rent a machine from a local electronic supply firm at a hefty price to actually do the job. What's worse is that some of those tapes are on 10-1/2 inch reels! Whenever that happens, I hope I don't have too many tapes that break in the process...

We quit using DAT in 1999 or 2000 at CC in the newsroom. Those are the last machines we used that actually transported tape. We have a reel-to-reel standing-by in a production room to dub old stuff to wave files just in case. It can take the 18" reels.

My first reel-to-reel was an Ampex 600 during the first Nixon administration at KTW. Press the small button, then crank the lever to the right into the "play" position and you're recording. Down the hall it was a huge floorstanding Presto machine and a wall of Magnacorders. Next to them were the transmitter meters we faked on the logs every 30 minutes.

We have an Otari 5050 that is not working with 12" reels of some old show that is mounted on wheels sitting in a back hallway for posterity here at Salem. At another station dubbed/produced many $ of commercials on a Teac Tascam 40-4.

I have two consumer reel-to-reel decks at home and some blank tapes. I haven't used them in several months. In the past, I have used them to time-shift radio programs and to record archival material.

One project that I have been meaning to take on for some time is the digitizing of some reels of Portland radio airchecks that were recorded in the mid 1970s by a deceased friend of a friend. My intent was to provide CDs of the airchecks to Dan or to put mp3s up on the Internet.

In a broadcast setting, I haven't used reel-to-reels since doing college radio in the late 1990s. At that time, we still had a variety of public service announcements that came in on reel-to-reel, as CD-Rs were still fairly new.

When I worked at KKPZ/KKSL, many of our programs came in on horrible-sounding cassettes. In that circumstance, I wished that consumer reel-to-reel equipment were still available! For the most part, the shows that were mastered on cassette were put together by people with very limited technical know-how who were not capable of using a computer to record the show and then burn it onto a CD-R. They needed something where they could just push "RECORD" and have the ability to record over their mistakes.

A related question on this subject is: if you are recording archive material, what do you use?

hi, I'm new to the board.
A little trick I learned for digitizing reel to reel:
go get a Ronco food dehydrator and bake your tapes for about 1 hr/ a side. This will remove most of the excess moisture on the tape (as we live in a wet climate), and prevent "sticky shed," AKA removing all of the audio on your tape in one pass, and you screaming "NOOOOOO!"

Yes, I still have two reel to reel machines at home that I use (one for production, one for backup) to digitally remaster old tapes of my own or ones that others give me.

While it is possible to get a flawless recording, I NEVER record directly to a computer. I don't want to spend the time listening to every millisecond for some buffer overflow problem while Windows gets distracted by some process I forgot to disable before I started recording (e.g. - e-mail, anti-virus update and scan, etc.).

My favourite device right now, to record to, is a TASCAM DP-01. Whether the source is tape, radio or microphone. It has a 40GB hard drive and (an undocumented) 12.5 hour time limit on any single recording in stereo or mono, as it stores each track as a WAV file and that is how long it takes to fill a 4GB mono wave file at 44Kbps. The file size in the wav header is 32 bits, and it is measured in bytes, so that translates into 4GB.

Really slow to transfer from the internal partition of the hard drive to the external one, from which you can use a USB port to transfer to your computer.

Second choice is a CD recorder. I currently use any of three LITEON models that begin LVW-5005. I record to regular CD-RW, preferably 80 minute ones, and then Digital Audio Extract (DAE) the CD-RW into my computer using (free software) Exact Audio Copy, which checks for attempts at error-correction by your computer's DVD or CD drive. Because DAE is not a real-time process, like recording is, if Windows get interrupted, it just catches the info on the next rotation of the disc.

I'm not sure I'd have a reel to reel machine in a radio station or recording studio. Unless, I knew for sure that I had some open reel tapes that I was going to use in the next year. Before I retired, I made the same decision at my employer's, only it was computer tape drives. We kept no drives that could read any previous (incompatible with current) technology tapes. We made a Business Case that showed that it was cheaper, when Risk was factored in, to farm out the conversion work should we ever find a tape we couldn't read. Because we knew that IBM had data centres in Canada, let alone the U.S., that could read open reel tapes that were obsoleted in the early 1980s by cartridges.

Adiant,
If you're unwilling to record directly onto a computer, what advantage does the Tascam device provide? Would it not be susceptible to the same file corruption as a computer, or any other analog-to-digital recording device? In other words, anything that digitally records is a type of computer.

Good question, Shane! The TASCAM, yes, is a computer. But the operating system is not Windows. It is an operating system that is meant for "real-time" processing. Windows is not meant for real-time processing. Windows worries about doing a whole bunch of different things based on some priority scheme. Real-time-aware operating systems have specific deadlines, usually measured in milliseconds, for doing tasks, like emptying the analogue audio buffer before it overflows.

Second, the TASCAM isn't doing anything else but recording. There is no anti-virus, e-mail, software update checkers. It isn't even connected to the Internet.

Third, in terms of file corruption, yes, it is still possible on the TASCAM, but extremely unlikely because the engineers who designed it would have been able to fully test all possible situations. Microsoft and the authors of software that runs on Windows have just too many permuations and combinations of events and different versions of Windows and other software running at the same time, to test all possibilities.

Ya, I was confused by that one too. He might be using that Tascam as a buffer drive to edit on , then install the final cut on his computer drive.

Ok, I just read you reply Adiant, I see...and understand...

Manalog sez--
"hi, I'm new to the board.
A little trick I learned for digitizing reel to reel:
go get a Ronco food dehydrator and bake your tapes for about 1 hr/ a side. This will remove most of the excess moisture on the tape (as we live in a wet climate), and prevent 'sticky shed,' AKA removing all of the audio on your tape in one pass, and you screaming 'NOOOOOO!'"

For everybody else--

Actually, this is a real fix as strange as it may seem. The musician Wendy Carlos posted an extensive bit about this on her web page. Apparently when she was doing her remaster of the "Tron" soundtrack (one of my favourite films, incidentally) for Disney several years ago, as well as a couple of others, it happened to her; as she describes it "the tapes turned to P.T.S. (Pure Tree Sap)..."

See, in the 1970s AGFA, Ampex and 3M, (and probably a couple of others) apparently decided to re-formulate the oxide used in their professional high-output tape stocks and they re-formulated the binder compounds in the process. This new type uses a hygroscopic crystalline adhesive (it absorbs water readily) so if the tapes are stored in a humid environment for an extended period of time the binder absorbs the water in the air and becomes liquid again, causing the oxide layer to peel off the tape. (It is explained better in the first article I linked to below.)

Wendy actually recommends a "Snackmaster" defydrator (made by American Harvest) and it is somewhat similar to the Ronco system, but also has a theromstat and convection fan.

Links outta here~
http://wendycarlos.com/newsold.html#baketape
http://wendycarlos.com/bake a tape/baketape.html
The original article-practially the same as Wendy's version~ http://www.tangible-technology.com/tape/baking1.html


Footnote: Apparently 3M decided to do this with some of their Scotch-branded "consumer" (i.e. home recording) 1/4" tapes in the early 80s as well.........because I discovered two such tapes in my Grampa's basement several years ago that had also turned to PTS. Sure enough, "baking a tape" really does work!

At the risk of starting a mini-craigslist, I'll entertain any reasonable offers on a nice Ampex AG440B half-track stereo machine with metered preamps. See my profile for my email address....

Adiant--

You mentioned your Tascam has a "real-time" operating system of some sort. Microware OS-9, perhaps?

(You might remember OS-9 if you ever used any of the old Philips "CD-Interactive" systems that were popular in the mid-1990s. They used a "variant" of sorts called CDI-RTOS, or "Compact Disc Interactive Real Time Operating System".)

Links outta here~
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CD-i
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OS-9
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microware

Note that this is NOT to be confused with the similarly-named "MicroSOFT", IBM's "OS/2" or Apple's "Mac OS 9". Those are all completely different products/companies! ;o)





Getting back to the main topic of the thread now--
I have mentioned in a couple of other threads I use an Akai 1720W. I really don't use it for mastering anything (I do that stuff pretty much all on the computer nowdays) but I do use it just for listening to music. Compared to modern systems there seems to be a wonderful sense of "old-fashionedness" emanating from the stereo when the machine is running.

Sidebar: About ten years ago, I knew a guy who had installed an AC/DC inverter in his car, and had a 1960's era Wollensak reel to reel deck plugged in and running on the passenger seat next to him, so he could have his music playing while he drove to and from work! This was some time before he got a CD player in his car.

(He lived in Manzanita but worked in Portland and would commute to/from work along the Sunset Hiway. As anyone who has driven that route knows it's a pretty long commute.....)

> Sidebar: About ten years ago, I knew a guy who had
> installed an AC/DC inverter in his car, and had a
> 1960's era Wollensak reel to reel deck plugged in
> and running on the passenger seat next to him, so
> he could have his music playing while he drove to
> and from work!

I hope that the inverter's frequency was fairly accurate; otherwise the music would be off-key!
8-0

I am really enjoying this thread. Forgive my lengthy post, I got here a bit late.

Shane, the Revox A77 decks from CBS are going to be used as variable tape delays in a popular local recording studio. I rescued them from the dumpster and passed them on.

Of course, in radio, computers have allowed production to be more complex, and yet, much faster than ever before. No shuttling, no splicing, and no minor timing issues to get in the way. Also, computers have a much smaller footprint in the studio. Heck, the speed and portability of laptop production may have saved a few marriages these last few years too.

Motozak, I can imagine this fellow driving down the freeway on a summer day. He is on the cell phone to his tech trying to stop the "death spill" that is now feeding tape out the passenger window at a million ips.

You are right about Wendy -- "tape baking" has saved many master tapes from that era. An acquaintance of mine, Steve Puntolillo, runs a brisk business doing transfers and restorations. To give you an idea of how bad things can get, check out this 2" 16-track master rescued after a flood:

http://www.sonicraft.com/A2DX/tape_baking.html

Many DATs, on the other hand, have quickly deteriorated, destroying much of the original tracking from more recent artists. There is no simple way to save compromised digital media on tape and often it is simply not worth trying.

I believe the DP-01 stores wav files in a Fat 32 partition on the computer. A friend of mine swears by his for working with a modular synthesizer. The idea of backing up on an external drive is universal in recording, so to have it built into a DAW is nice at that price point. Am I close to the mark, Adiant?

Computers have done a really fine job of replacing the editing block, but as far as being truly musical, analog is still the highest standard. Of course, I fall into the Walter Sear camp on this one. I have a Scully 280-B, an Ampex AG-440B, and a Uher 4000 that I enjoy a great deal.

How often do I use them? As often as I can, and certainly more often than computers for tracking. Editing in the box is fantastic, but outboard gear and analog tape is still my favorite option.

Mikekolb, I may have to ask you to write me about that 440. :0)

Why do DATs and other digital media deteriorate in an irreparable manner? Does it have to do with the composition of the binder and oxides? Is it because the decks use helical scanning heads? Is it because of the way that the signal is encoded? Or, is it something else?

Alfredo, there are a variety of factors and you have already nailed some biggies. In my experience, an analog tape might have a drop out from an anomaly, but data is much more of an all or nothing proposition. Reels and cassettes like climate controlled environments and a lack of magnetic field, but most are far more forgiving over the long term than DAT and digital tape.

Also, the transports on DAT machines simply were not made to last. The ones that do work seem to be rougher on media than the cassette multitracks from the same era. Beyond being rigged up as a poor man's analog to digital converter, most DAT units have become useless in a relatively short period of time.

The contrast is striking when you compare them to reel to reel decks -- like the Ampex AG-300, MR-70, etc. -- that continue to run with regular maintenance for many decades. Though it was unveiled at AES over 30 years ago, the Ampex ATR-102 is still the standard for mastering at many recording studios.

I remember trying to bulk erase a DAT tape once about ten years ago. It didn't work...

Needless to say, I was a little behind in my learning curve...

You were not the only one! One can only laugh after doing something completely goofy like that.

Alfredo, I think the trade off between robustness and overall capacity has always been biased toward more capacity, leaving us with more fragile digital media than we could have had.

Given information densities are always increasing, capacity, for a given digital media transport medium, is at best a shorter term problem. But that does not sell well, and the booth babes can't say, "Oohh, but did you know ours does a gigamagaquad / second?" Nobody finds out about the short media life, or handling problems until long after that product cycle has completed.

The beauty of it, is those same frustrated people will come back to the boothies and buy in again!

(My apologies ladies. There are guy "booth babes" too --call 'em fanbois!)

Little has a great point on the mechanical end of things also. Most digital media handling systems are just cheap ass!

Found this out a while back too. I've an older CD changer that crapped out. For years, I had a coupla CD's in there, just because I regularly will listen to them. They are scratched all to heck!

That SONY never missed a beat. 40 second buffer, and full software error correction meant extremely good sound a very high percentage of the time.

I've not found a drive, other than older school CD-ROM's (the external, expensive SCSI kind) that can read that disc. Tried it on some pretty darn expensive units too.

Somewhere I've got an old SGI DAT. Those computers come with DAT audio capable software. The usual stuff, read, write, etc... The only difference between those drives and your run of the mill computer backup data DAT is a small bit of firmware.

Lots of this stuff boils down to a few companies actually making the stuff, making it really cheap so it will scale, and making up for those thin margins through something horrible, I've always called: "Software Differentiation".

By contrast, the old Reel to Reel stuff (analog stuff in general) was engineered during a time when buying something once actually mattered!

Good handling characteristics mattered too, largely because of the generation problem in the analog space. One could very easily be working with the only copy of something great! How many times does one actually see that in the digital space today?

The digital space also comes with this simply horrible 3 year replace it cycle. Always something bigger, better, more bad ass, etc...

Funny, that old SGI, running at a brisk 350Mhz, will still do a nice NTSC television weather map, with gen-locked display, records full frame video to disk, and many other things just as well today as it did in the mid 90's. I'm sure others can step up and detail similar experiences with their Amigas, Suns, etc...

This is true for a lot of stuff.

Honestly, I believe if it's made too well, people might actually consider using it for longer than the 3 years, and with that goes a lot of regular quarterly income, increased pressure on software companies to actually work harder on open data formats and overall performance.

With that goes whole industries that have evolved around dealing with the consequenses of this new kind of engineering. Heck, we've got products and services blended together now too. Lots of devices come with subscription this and that. Those added services are nice, but does the product they are sold with have to be locked down and useless on all fronts without them?

Goes on and on.

Sorry, one more little example, relevant to the irreparable bit Alfredo mentioned. I've stored a ton of stuff on DATs. Lost more on DATs than I have just about anything else too.

Good digital formats can exhibit every element of good analog. Case in point: The SGI backup system could break up a large file system into little mini-file systems, then write all of that to tape in blocks. Have a drop out? You only lose what is in that particular mini-file system block. It's damn cool, and one of the only saving graces where storing large amounts of data on DAT were concerned.

One could choose that file system size too. Bigger chunks run faster, but risk is higher. Little ones run slow, but risk is low.

Guess what most people did?

Yeah, they took what is a robust format and made it run fast, and lost lots of stuff! Those are the ones I got to try and recover. Never the nice and slow, but stable ones.

It is quite interesting that the mechanical simplicity and relatively large physical size of analog reel-to-reel tape transports are what contributes to the longevity of these recordings. In other words, simple wins in the long run.

I remember that in the late 1990s/early 2000s, Portland Cable Access and other such facilities were making a big deal about the importance of switching to digital tape systems, along with lots of fanfare about the nicer pictures that these formats produced. I started to suspect that a big reason that the manufacturers were pushing these new digital decks was that digital electronics had gotten powerful and cheap enough that it was possible to make the tape transports cheaper (more jitter) and the tapes physically smaller (poorer signal-to-noise ratio) and then make up for the poorer performance of the transport and tape with electronics.

I am currently in the process of recovering audio from what appear to be some poorly burnt 2002 vintage CDRs. Cdparanoia and my CDR drive of roughly the same vintage have been struggling for many hours, slowly pulling audio from these discs. The other CD-ROM drives that I have tried couldn't extract any data from these discs. I think that the moral of the story here is that if you want to archive stuff long-term, use simple tools: analog reel-to-reel. It wouldn't hurt to store some spare parts to help keep the reel-to-reel decks functional in the future.

"Motozak, I can imagine this fellow driving down the freeway on a summer day. He is on the cell phone to his tech trying to stop the "death spill" that is now feeding tape out the passenger window at a million ips."

Ha!

Ya know, I always did wonder how he was able to keep the thing tracking properly while going down the long hilly, wind-y Sunset. Even when I move my Akai while it is playing it "rolls" somewhat because of the torque on the large capstan flywheel.

But then again, his Wollensak was a smaller unit (considerably smaller than my Akai, but technically not a "portable" in that it was a tabletop unit that could run 7" reels) so I imagine the flywheel in his tape deck wasn't as big.

Oh yeah, and to put it in time perspective: his cell phone at the time was an AMPS unit, and at that time AMPS was really still the only thing there was for the mainstream......


To be perfectly honest tho, for mastering my recordings I really don't even bother with DAT's, largely because of the deterioration and mechanical breakdowns addressed above, as well as the all-or-nothing nature of digital data.

I use the HiFi audio tracks of my VHS deck in SP mode (EP doesn't work that great for me because of tracking issues, especially since I have one VCR in the "studio" and another in my "lab"......but the HiFi (I think) gives me results similar to that of a DAT, and certainly better than when I used to use cassette mastering some time ago!

Needless to say, I have logged quite a few hours of Muzak programming taped off my satellite and recorded on CD this way...........

And yes, if I am recording my music for the reel to reel, I forst master it in HiFi VHS forst then run the reels at 7 1/2 IPS. Practically have to because my computer & sat receiver are in a different room than the R2R deck, so running direct from the computer/sat box line out into the Akai would be difficult, if not completely impractical.

There's a Sony Reel to reel for sale at Mcminnville Goodwill! It's been there a couple weeks now.
I used one in the 70's instead of 8 track or cassetts!

In addition to the Ampex AG440, I've managed to hold-on to an old Akai reel-to-reel, bought at a Navy PX when I was in Subic Bay, Philippines during the late 60's!

But the cool thing about it (and basically why I've kept it all these years) is that it'll play 15/16", 1-7/8" 3-3/4" and 7-1/2" IPS... (never mind that it hasn't been plugged-in for 20 years... that's a trivial point)

Speaking of reel to reel machines, I had a laugh today...I got a new 40 inch LCD TV. It had some problems and I got it fixed on warranty at this Electronics place. I picked it up today and the 'girl'..woman..person ( about 19 or 20 ) in the front office was very nice and doing her job just fine.

A guy came in and dropped off this component stereo/CD whatever unit for repair. She gave him a computer receipt and it printed out 'reel to reel ' in the equipment line. The guy saw it and came back in the store and pointed this out. So she took a look at it , gave him a corrected receipt, he left , and she looked up at me and said " I dont even know what a reel to reel is"...I giggled and told her that it was a *Tape Machine*. She says " Oh I know what tape is but doesnt it come in those little cassette things that not many people use anymore"...So I had to explain that a reel to reel actually transported bigger tape from 7 inch reels etc etc...She seemed genuinely interested in what that equipment line on her chooser was..*reel to reel*...Ha Ha Ha...I guess old people are good for something after all.......

Wow......I am 23, but I have known what a "reel to reel" is since I was 5 and in Kindegarden, when Grampa took one of his 1720's off the shelf and introduced me to it. Should be worth noting that that very machine is the one currently in my posession!

I trust you're taking good care of it!

Yes indeed. There's not even a scratch on its cabinet, save for the holes drilled in the top where the handle is mounted of course. ;o) This also helps should something go wrong inside the box: http://www.obsoletemedia.com/tapedecks/manuals/akai1720w/

Hint: Print it out first, it's easier to read that way.

It did help me to replace the speakers when the right one went out a few years ago! (It originally had the factory-stock speaks but now sports two 4"*6" oval-shaped KLH speaks with Kevlar cones.) With the exception of that, the handle and the two extra pinch rollers I have on hand, everything else in the machine (to the best of my knowledge, anyways; Grampa had the machine for some 30 years before I got it) is original.

There's more at http://www.obsoletemedia.com/tapedecks/manuals/ as well.

Motozak... your Akai 1720-W looks mighty similar to my Akai X150-D.

http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/akai_x_150_dx150.html

Since you referred-to speakers, it looks as though one difference would be that my X150-D has no speakers or amplifier (it's a "deck-only" machine). Curious if the 1720-W also uses a removable sleeve over the drive capstan to double (or half) the speeds?

The wooden cabinets and basic layout look almost identical.

I bet the 1720 could be based somewhat on the X150D (not really certain tho, I would need to do a bit of research on that.) The X150-D was a late-1960s model; whereas the 1720 was from the mid-'70s.

In fact, the 1720 has an even stronger resemblance to the previous 1710--
Links outta here:
http://www.angelfire.com/electronic2/vintagetx/Akai1710.html
http://photobucket.com/albums/v500/dantiques/tapedecks/180.jpg
http://www.obsoletemedia.com/tapedecks/akaimodels.htm

I am 100% certain that the 1720 is based in no small part on the 1710 which also had a built-in amp and speakers. Probably the biggest differences between the '10 and '20 is the '10 had four tubes on its record & playback pre-amps and the power control on the front was a switch. Contrast to the 1720, which is all-transistor and has a push-button power switch. (That, and the 1720 doesn't have the metal flaps behind the speakers. At least not factory-standard........)

I have never actually used a 1710 myself so I really can't comment on that particular machine, but I have read quite a few favourable reports on its operation, right up to someone mentioning to me that if you use a 1720, you are practically using a 1710 with a different face plate! ;o) Grampa says he had a '10 some years ago that he traded for one of his '20s when he was still in the Army.

"Curious if the 1720-W also uses a removable sleeve over the drive capstan to double (or half) the speeds?"

Yes it does. In fact, the little "clip" above the upper right of the head box was a mounting pin upon which you could put the outer sleeve when it wasn't being used so it wouldn't get lost.

I am told the 1720, like the 1710 before it, can also run at 15 IPS when set at high speed (7 1/2 if set at low) by using a somewhat "fatter" capstan sleeve that apparently was available at the time, but I don't have one of those........

One of my reel-to-reels is an Akai X100-D, which is a more basic version of the above two decks and is roughly of mid 1960s vintage. Metal cased germanium transistors are used throughout this unit. Mine did not include the capstan sleeve, so I cannot run at 7 1/2 ips.

One deficiency of this deck is the clutch that is used to develop torque for the takeup reel. When this part starts to wear, it starts to tug at the tape instead of applying even tension. This causes an audible "warblyness" to some types of sounds. My guess that to fix this, I would have to do some creative machining, as I am unlikely to find spare parts for these machines.

"One deficiency of this deck is the clutch that is used to develop torque for the takeup reel. When this part starts to wear, it starts to tug at the tape instead of applying even tension. This causes an audible "warblyness" to some types of sounds."

Yes......my Grampa's machine does this as well. This is probably my one beef with my machine is the friction drive, which under many conditions is unreliable, and is subject to wear, dirt, whatever else...............

http://www.obsoletemedia.com/tapedecks/manuals/akaix150dservice/html/page06.htm and
http://www.obsoletemedia.com/tapedecks/manuals/akaix150dservice/
(This stuff is for the X150D, but I imagine they must be similar, especially in the transport. The transport system in my 1720 is similar to this as well, more or less......)

Alfredo, if it isn't worn out too badly you may also try cleaning the bushings on the take-up reel side (the two wheels with the presumably white hubs.) I saved my machine from this fate a couple of years ago, but also the main bushing (the big rubber roller in the centre, right below the speed switch) wasn't really worn down either, just had a good layer of about 25 years worth of dirt, household dust and other crap built up all over it. Some rubbing alcohol, Q-tips and a couple of cotton balls later and I am good.

Oh yes, NEVER oil the contact surfaces of the bushings either.......... ;o)

============ Scatterbrained technical mechanical stuff follows this line. =============

See, what happens is the white-hub wheel in the centre is coupled to the motor. It swings to the right when it is in the play or fast-forward position. There it rides against the small wheel between it and the other white-hub wheel to the lower left of the take-up side. This small wheel in the centre effectively creates a reduction drive and sets the wheels to run in the proper direction, so the take-up side runs at the appropriate speed for your tape. Also, when you pull the pause lever up, the wheel is pulled away from the take-up platter, basically putting that side in neutral. Likewise, when you put the machine in rewind, the centre wheel swings to the right, contacting the large, black wheel on the left which rides against a smaller bushing in the centre of the supply hub, creating another reduction drive which makes the supply side spin fast enough to rewind the tape. The only time the supply reel side is actually engaged is when the machine is set to rewind.

Unfortunately these wheels and bushings do gather dirt and can wear out over time, which as you said Alfredo, causes uneven tension and makes the sound "warble".....I have heard it happen myself........

Hmmm, this might be your lucky day, Motozak. If memory serves correctly, I may have that "somewhat fatter capstan sleeve" you mentioned.

The standard sleeve will stay with my X150D, but if (and that's a big 'if') I can lay hands on the larger 15ips version, it's yours if you want it. If you don't, someone else might. Lemme know.