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In Reply to: RE: Lapping RTR tape heads and aligning them posted by jtkarma on September 27, 2007 at 11:19:24
I've lapped CPUs before back in the overclocking days. Plus this deck is pretty bashed up already. I got it for $75 with three 10.5 metal reels. I've sold two of the reels for $45.
I'm guessing that the reason I have no sound on the left channel is that the heads for both record and play are so grooved. If I can lap it myself and come up with a basic alignment, I'm ahead of the game.
Still looking for some lapping instructions. I've heard that the metal on the heads is quite soft actually.
Go go MacGyver!
Follow Ups:
I say go for it! There used to be a step by step instruction page on lapping heads. I was thinking it was on the Nortronics site but I didn't see it there. They used to sell a kit.
I'm thinking that it's not the grooved heads that's you problem though. You say that you get zero sound from the left channel. Even if the tape was just touching the outside edge of the head (left channel is the outermost position on a 1/4 track head) you should get sound. Put on an old tape and move the tape as it's playing against the head with your finger just before and after the head. While you have your finger out, try dragging it on the supply reel increasing tape tension. Look at the tape path for anything that might be keeping the tape from making decent contact with the head. Is the tape centered on all the guides and heads? A shift of the tape path toward the face of your deck could be keeping it from going over the left channel part of the playback head.
Another thing it could be is your playback level pots. Try rotating both over and over. Is it scratchy sounding? If so, get yourself some Caig DeOxit and squirt in the little opening on the back of the pots and rotate over and over.
Do your tests with headphones from the jack on the Teac. That rules out any problems with the RCA> IC> Preamp etc.
If all this fails, try The Teac Place http://www.daeinconline.com/index.html
Or this one has some troubleshooting stuff with pictures;
http://www.angelfire.com/electronic2/vintagetx/
I knew I saw this PDF somewhere. I stumbled across it this am.
http://recordist.com/ampex/reptips.html
Thanks for all the great info you gave me.
This is turning into a great project.
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