On Mon, 17 Dec 2012 09:23:21 +0000 (GMT), Jim Lesurf
wrote:

In article , Johny B Good
wrote:
On Sun, 16 Dec 2012 09:57:51 +0000 (GMT), Jim Lesurf
wrote:

The very idea of sending the cartridge output directly to phono sockets
on a seperate amplifier via a yard or so of screened cable didn't appeal
one iota to me. After all, you don't do this to the replay head of a
tape deck.

Actually, back in the 1950s/60s people did often buy the tape 'deck' with
no electronics and seperately buy or DIY the electronics, using a
reasonably length of coax between the head and the preamp! People like
Armstrong used to sell PABO units (playback amp and bias oscillator) units
for this to punters.


Indeed. I remember buying such a unit (a Garrard, IIRC) sometime in
the early to mid sixties. AFAICR, it was designed to take 4 inch reels
but came with a forerunner of the Philips cassette designed to be
loaded with 3 and 3 1/2 inch reels. I never used it in anger.

Just prior to that, I'd bought a small (and very cheap) battery
operated portable reel to reel recorder (3 inch reels) that was so
primitive that it didn't have a capstain, tape transport during
recording and playback was courtesy of the take up reel driven by a
speed stabilised dc motor. Also, it used DC bias and the erase
function was impleneted by a small permanent magnet mounted on a swing
away arm.

That one I did use. I've got a few of those late night 'Horror'
stories that Radio Caroline (South? Not sure because the one in the
Irish Sea (North) was our local Pirate Radio station of choice[1])
used to broadcast just around midnight.

I no longer have that crude portable recorder but the tapes are quite
playable on a normal deck set to 3 3/4 ips (IIRC - it may even have
approximated the cassette tape speed of 1 7/8 ips - I might dig my
portable philips reel to reel (3 inch reel tables) out of the basement
(proper capstain drive, AC erase and bias, you know, the full works
;-) ) and try some of those old recordings[2].

If there's any interstation heterodyne in those recordings (4 or
5KHz) I might even be able to stabilise and regulate the playback
speed in CoolEdit Pro (even if there isn't any usable heterodyne, I
can still manually adjust the playback speed along the length of the
recording and resample). Considering all the other defficiencies of
that crude tape recorder, tape speed will be the least of my problems.

[1] Unlike the locals, I was able to recieve Caroline South any time
of the day on my home brewed transistorised 'Superhet' MW portable
radio using only the internal 7 or 8 inch ferrite rod as the aerial.
Admittedly, the LO sideband noise became rather intrusive at these
very low signal levels.

I'd added an extra tuned IF stage to beef up the sensitivity and
selectivity somewhat which also allowed the AGC to operate over a
wider range. I didn't have to turn the volume up on a weak station,
you knew it was weak without looking at the S meter simply from the
amount of LO sideband noise that polluted such reception. A weak
station didn't go quieter than a strong one, just noisier.

[2] If this doesn't work with the Philips tape recorder, I can always
fall back on my antique Akai M8 tape recorder to play them since it
has a 1 7/8 ips speed option as well as the more standard 3 3/4 and 7
1/2 ips speeds.

--
Regards, J B Good