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Very nice. One question. What is the ATS-1 ?

Just found your channel and subscribed. Very nice work

As a recording machine collector (over 350) I have seen a similar machine in Germany that has multi tracks and moveable head set up. This may be a homebrew or someone's prototype. Paper tape was active 1946-53 made by Scotch, Brush and possibly others . Surprisingly I have dubbed airchecks on paper tape from the late 40's early fifties with pretty good success. It holds up remarkably well. Wax cylinders and their content from the early 20th century dictation machines (edison and others ) are been dubbed and are available on the net . I saw that machine and was tempted. I'm glad you have it !

Many thanks fore these 22 minutes of pure magnetoporn! 👍

Interesting! Any progress on this?

hey there, is there any chance we can see more of this machine ? i would absolutely love to see it running and hear whats on it !

Want to have one like this

Techmoan would love this

❤

Can conect to plc this motor? Its possible? (Driver)

You are aware that wire recorders use magnetic heads just as tape recorders do right? The main difference between a magnetic head for wire and a magnetic head for tape is the wire head has a small V groove for the wire to ride in VS a tape head that has no groove (granted some earlier tape heads do guides the width of the tape) built into the head). I tend to agree its a tape machine as a wire recorder wouldn't give manual control of head height instead automatically cycling the head up and down to keep the wire wrap consistent. Your player reminds me of the internals of this: czcams.com/video/xE2GEmHque8/video.html

Jealous

Even the "cheap" Nagras are far too costly for me. I will just have to be satisfied with my Sony TC-770-4, which is in very nice condition visually, audibly, and mechanically. I even have a 2-track tape that I can use to demo its 'extra' play head.

Given your age, such spontaneous purchases is money down the toilet.

VERY VERY NCE

Remember they were filming an episode of Dallas in Krum (TX) and they were suppose to be in Louisiana. Saw one of these (it may've been stereo) and they had a camera on railroad tracks (or whatever). You mentioned that it came from a Dallas film studio, I think there was one between Fort Worth and Dallas and they had the bench from Forest Gump.

This is porn 🙂

Congrats on the Nagra - watching from the UK. I also need the grey gasket but cant find a supplier in the UK. Would you mind posting the ebay link?

Congratulation with you new Nagra; it is a really great machine, and your seem to be in a quite good condition. I have a couple of comments: 1) Polishing. I saw Adam Savages video, and although I have the deepest respect for him (and his taste in gear), it hurt a bit when I saw him polish it with disposable paper towels. This is the best way to make fine scratches, so always use a clean, soft cloth. I use the Novus products for my Nagras, and I have the same polishing machine as Adam, but I still prefer hand polishing. It simply gives a better result, unless you have a lot of really deep scratches. And even then, I would recommend machine polishing the worst scratches away and then hand polish 2) the pinch roller. As far as I can see it is an original neoprene Nagra pinch roller, and they are very expensive and very durable. They feel a bit hard, but they are absolutely fine; normally it will have a white powdery coating if it is getting bad. Yours (which seem to be a bit black) just need to be cleaned. 3) The belts. Unlike many other older recorders, belts (and capacitors...) rarely fail. Especially the gray neoprene belt almost never fail, and if the black left belt is not slack or have any other obvious problems, I wouldn't´t replace them. The replacements will be worse than the ones you got now... I love Nagras, both the build quality and the history surrounding them. But be warned: It is highly addictive to collect them...

I have a mind to design a tape mech. You know, because nobody makes them anymore. For cassettes obviously. But I have an idea to build one out of modern bits, minus all the complex mechanicals. And every time I see a cool tape thing I'm reminded of my idea. Beautiful machine.

a piece of art😍

Beautiful! I've always wanted one too. I have a Revox B77 and a Uher 4000 - but there's space on the shelf for a Nagra.

That Nagra is so SEXY. 😛

My favourite bit is the track counter, with its futuristic, art-deco aesthetic. It is a beautiful piece of design on its own, like an elevator from the Empire State.

You are not going to want to find any 2 inch, 3M Scotch, 111, Acetate Tape. Don't even think about it. It has long turned to dust years back years ago. You will be stuck with some, Agfa, Ampex, tape. 3M shut down decades ago. And it's all very sticky now. And so that thing is now just a mere, museum piece, amusement. 2 inch wide paper recording tape? Not seen in many decades. Was the case of this device a repackaged something? Of course it was! It was originally a Radio. And a radio, only. Before this top loaded abomination was created. It is amazing however. And truly like nothing I have ever seen before. I mean who made an alignment tape for it? LOL. Right there was never an alignment tape for this thing. It was not designed for music, to be sure. It was designed for storytelling. It's an abomination it's very funny. It's certainly a unique find. For those who thought they had it all. Nope! I mean I've owned just about every recorder made on planet Earth also. Not to mention my Sony, Pioneer,, Panasonic/Technics, REVOX, TEAC, TASCAM, Otori who am I leaving out? Who have I owned and the memories have faded? And my very first ever purchased. With my $20 a birthday money. At 8 years of age. I got a Peerless. Portable battery-operated recorder. That could take big 3 in Israel's. And when I made my first musical recording of mommy singing. And I played it back. I suddenly realized I had been ripped off! It sounded like crap! It was no good for music. It was only good for a little kid who was 8 years old.. And I wanted better! It was only then. I discovered. What a capstan and pinch roller were for. And that forever changed me. Because by the time I was 14 years of age. I got my dads, Sony TC-630, recorder. That included 2 nice, 6 inch speakers! And had a built-in audio amplifier with both Bass and Treble controls. 3 heads and an, Echo Control! I was in heaven! And then I learned what that control called Bias was for. And I would adjust that. Until playback sounded just like the input. Instead of all, muddy. I wanted everything to sound its best! And I found out about, 3M Scotch, 202 and 203 Dyna-Range Tape. And then they came out with 206! And that was a game changer! But only with the Scotch, 206. My homemade passive, 1/4 inch input, 3 channel mixer. With a pan pot on one channel. So I can have 3 channel Stereo instead of just 2. Left-Center-Right. And with my 3 microphones. And my homemade, spring reverb. I made my first on location recording of mom. At her, Accompanist's home downtown Detroit. With lots of traffic right outside of his window of his home. With trucks and buses and cars going by. And I only had short microphone cords. So I was sitting right underneath the grand piano. With my tape recorder. And at 14 years of age I got this recording: soundcloud.com/user3139903/mom-i-dream-too-much-1970 I made this nearly 54 years ago, when I was 14 years old. I was planning on becoming a recording engineer. This is one of my first efforts ever. Recorded on the Sony TC-630. At 7.5 IPS. Tweaked by ear. Because I had no oscillator yet. Nor voltmeter. I didn't know what those were for yet? Not really. But would become vital to me later that year and for the rest of my career. And you certainly have a passion for these things. You are certainly nuts. But somebody has to be. To keep this history alive. Because I won't be for much longer. I'm one of the last surviving members. Of one of those legendary American studio tape recorder companies. And it was such an honor for me. I can hardly believe I made it there. And affected the entire industry. With what I've done and what I've discovered. To make them even better. They were amazing devices for the times.. Look at all the fabulous music they recorded. All the history they have captured for us. And that virtually everybody could have their own. I don't think anything is going to be this kind of wondrous ever again. We were amazed by it. We were enraptured by it. Many of us still are. It's a sickness I tell you! It's a great sickness! But I have to get rid of just about everything I have ever owned if I'm going to live the rest of my days in a motorhome as a nomad hermit. I've got no children of my own. My husband long dead. My younger brother, Ted.. My mother will be 100 in January. She's not going to be around for much longer. And when she goes I go hit the road. To start my new life of retirement. In abject poverty. Since other things went terribly wrong. When you are attacked and robbed. Of all your retirement savings. And your business. And your career. Add your freedoms. From the psychopathic Texans that don't like Americans from elsewhere. Lovely scumbag lowlifes that they are. And so bad things happen to good people like me. And there is no rule of law in Texas. There's only the rule of Texans. And they are not in their right minds. None of them. There's something terribly wrong with Texans and Texas. It could be arsenic. As I'm not a doctor. I'm not a research scientist. I'm just a well-informed seasoned engineer. Now retired. And I know that arsenic blowing in the wind in Texas has made the news any number of times. With warnings. For people to stay indoors. Windows closed. Air conditioning on. Do not go outside unless you have to. Do not exercise outside. Do not allow your children to be outside. Arsenic is blowing in the wind. Which is a natural substance in the earth. Not good for human consumption. Great for making LEDs and Semi Conductors like transistors, CPUs, GPU's, integrated circuit chips, LEDs. We can't make any of that stuff without the arsenic needed. And it's free! Free in the ground. A lot in Texas. And I think therein lies the problem with Texans. And so in a wife of micro dosing arsenic. Texans just ain't normal. They are about as cruel as Hitler. And call themselves Conservatives. Which they hardly are. And don't know the actual meaning of that word, conservative. Because they don't know how to be? They just like saying it. Like say hallelujah! Some know how to say that. They contributed nothing to that. Tape is gone. It's a thing of the past. The best sounding recording tape was 3M. Hands down! The Ampex product sounded fizzy and the Agfa product sounded dull.. The 3M would jump out of the tape recorder at you. It had the biggest boldest most open quality to the sound. I'll never forgive them for taking it off the market when they did. And now tape manufacturing has been passed down from, one guy's garage to the next. It's a filthy dirty business. You are dealing with dirty dirt. Lots of carbon black dirt. Just to make some damned recording tape! At let's be clear here. While 3M made some great plastics. And some great sounding oxides. The best, Slit Tape. Was the Agfa, product. Their slitting was superior. Way better. And you would see the difference. When in Fast Forward or Rewind. The tape would pack smoothly with the Agfa product. Not with the Ampex nor the 3M. Today? The product is anybody's guess? It's a decent, low noise, high output, oxide recipe. And largely related to the, Ampex formulation. As that was sold from their later name, Quantagy. And now one name after another. There is a lot of confusion about tape formulations also. When talking about the BASF 900 stuff. Or something like that? That was not a low noise high output mastery tape, formulation. It was Average Normal, mostly. And everybody is getting their information wrong. But it really doesn't matter anymore. It mattered back in the 1960s-70s-80s and 1990s. And that was about the end of it. Because then we got digital tape and digital cassettes. And nobody needed to water their horse again. Except for you nostalgic types. That want to keep the lights on and the tape rolling. Thank you. RemyRAD…… Scully/AMPRO 1979/80

This is the most bizarre looking magnetic recording contraption I have ever seen! Yes! I am absolutely blown away by this, Abomination. A 2 inch, 24 Track, home, recorder. And to be certain. This thing sounds like absolute total crap! It can't really hold a consistent speed over the duration of the tape. There is no fidelity to this. Likely records at 100% Saturation. And requires no erase head. It can record, Talking. I would imagine sort of. It's certainly not designed for music applications. And if it was? Where are all the available recordings? Right never were any made. LOL. This is a Monstrosity! I had an obsession with tape recorders also. It started with a Weber Echo Tape, recorder in our living room. My grandfather had a Presto 900 series. With its own separate, 4 channel mixer! And then I got a Magnacord P-63! Not those other funky little things. This was as big as an Ampex 350. And then we had an AKAI 800? 8H? I forget? It was AKAI's version of an Ampex 602. Along with a pair of matching 8 inch speakers! But the machine also had a 4 x 5" speaker in the top of its case. And vacuum tube amplifier outputs for the speakers. It sounded great. It had the adjustable, X-Field Heads. At it could do, 1/4 track consumer stereo. It could also do 1/2 track, Professional Stereo. And it could run at 3.75, 7.5 and AND! 15 IPS. Yes! As it had a removable capstan sleeve. And was 2 speeds. But really 3 speeds. But then my world was changed. At 7 years of age. Daddy was a violinist in the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. And for extra dollars he also played string tracks for Stax records and Motown. And there they were! Ampex-300, Ampex-350, Ampex 351, Ampex 400 pusher, Scully 270 and Ampex AG-440 A-8 Track, 1 inch, recorder. And I knew. I would be using these soon. For the rest of my life and career long. And never did I realize. What was about to happen. It was only a few years later by 1972. I was able at 17 years of age. To take the, Ampex, Factory Trained and Authorized Warranty Service Person, Course. Learn how they were made and how to fix them. After that came 3M and their, M-79 multitrack product. Then came MCI of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Where I had moved to. And my apartment. Was 600 feet away. From the back door to the Shop at MCI. And I took their technical training seminars for all of their products. Consoles included. But then a really funny thing happened. At the advertising agency I was employed by. The boss let me get 4 new tape recorders. 2 MCI machines. At 2 Scully 280 B's. The MCI machines were great! But I really preferred using the Scully's for most of my work. But what's this? These brand-new recorders are not working correctly? What the hell? Right out of the crate. These things won't tweak up, properly. I have to start troubleshooting brand-new machines? Yes. In the ensuing weeks. I was on the phone regularly. With the VP of the firm and an electrical engineer himself. But not the company electrical engineer. At they were having terrible problems with their own machines. AMPRO Broadcast Products Incorporated. Had purchased Scully from the Dictaphone Corporation. A year and 1/2 earlier. And none of these machines were working properly. The VP said they needed my help. Need my help? We need your help. And he offered me a management position. Yes I became the final, QC Manager for Scully. Never in my wildest dreams. Did I ever think I would find myself working for such a legendary company? They told me they need me to figure out what the hell was wrong? Because 2 electrical engineers couldn't. I am not an electrical engineer. I am a bona fide high school dropout with nothing more than a GED. And a couple of technical training seminars. But? I had a job to do to save the company. And so it took me a couple of weeks to figure out the problem. And it turns out to be no good. When you use the wrong wiring harness for this series, circuit board. Oh whoops. The right one was lost between Los Angeles and the trip to Philadelphia. There was no record of it. So I had to create the new template. And once wired correctly. TA-DA! And only because they had thought they were wired correctly. And that was just the beginning of other less serious problems. As is rather fascinating to note. All of the parts that are used. Come from parts manufacturers. That always feature a disclaimer. And the disclaimer reads. COMPANY RESERVES THE RIGHT TO MAKE CHANGES WITHOUT NOTICE. And while parts might have the same values and ratings. They are not always the same. This causes vastly different performance characteristics. Frequency response characteristics. Distortion characteristics. Longevity. All that stuff. And I had never worked in a factory before. And I am in charge of Quality Control for the entire factory. And I upped the ante. I improved upon the machines. To make some of the best they had ever shipped. There is a Scully enthusiasts user board. That I contributed to for some years. And a few years back. A couple of the members. Sent me emails with attachments. They were pictures. Of a test data sheet. For their machine from 1979. With my signature at the bottom. And my rubberstamp inside their machine. Still running perfectly. After all these years. That made me very proud. As I still have my last personal two of them. And I will have to be parting with them after all these years. I have to move and downsize. Down to a motorhome. And there will be no more room for such pleasant memories and luxuries. I have more than just those 2 Scully's. I have a unique reel to reel recorder. I bet you would love to have. It's a little-known machine. But quite substantial nevertheless. It's a machine from Michigan. From a mathematics and electrical engineering professor by the name of Lesher. I have a 1/4 inch, Stereo, 2 Track, Lesher. All vacuum tube machine. And virtually like new. With original heads. Not yet broken in. Motown used a 1/2 inch, 4 Track version of this machine. And it's very much like an Ampex 351-2. Michigan Style. As he was a professor at the University of Michigan. And he started making tape recorders in the late 1950s early 1960s. I got it from a friend of the families who was the principal double bass player in the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. His wife was the principal harpsichordist. And they were good friends with my parents. And when she passed on. Her second husband Rod offered me this machine. And strangely enough. It came back to me when I turned 60. Though, I had purchased it from John Matthews when I was 15 years old. But mom made me give it back to John. Because it was really too big for our 2 bedroom apartment. And I never saw it again. Until just recently. I was absolutely blown away. The machine had not changed one bit. The wear on the heads had not increased one bit. It has never been used. It might have 50 hours on it? It's a working collector's item that is virtually new. The microphones I had also gotten with it both at 15 and at 60. Were already sold. They were the first US, FET,, Large-cap diaphragm Condenser Microphone. From, Syneron CU-7. Later known as the Fairchild F-22, microphones. When they purchased the company. As it used Fairchild's first FET transistor. Looked like a Neumann U-87 but was more like an, AKG 414. But only cardioid. But could not be Phantom Powered. They would only take 22.5 volt Malory Batteries. No longer made nor available and no retrofits to replace them. And another weird battery. For the FET powering. As the other 2 batteries were only to polarize the diaphragm. Must have 48 volts. But never got more than, 45 volts. And therefore could never really work to their full potential. Without 48 volts, polarizing the diaphragm. 45 works but not at its best. But they had to start somewhere. And a year or two later Neumann worked out Phantom Power. Sennheiser had something similar but it wasn't Phantom. I think it was called A/B powering? And you would find that on some of those Sennheiser shotgun microphones. And it looked like Phantom but it wasn't Phantom. And Phantom would not work. On those Sennheiser microphones. So you had to have a special battery pack or special AC adapter. Until they joined the Phantom Revolution. And got on board with that. To have a standard. You could plug into any mixer and it would work. And thankfully what we have today. That has also caused its own problems. But hey? Nothing is perfect. When, microphones need power to generate, power. Of which they do not generate, much. It's a teensy little bit. And needs big time pre-amplification. To go anywhere. This recorder is an amazing piece of trash we are looking at. Obviously from some kind of troubled mind. But amazing in its own right. Because at first I thought it was some kind of, Communications Logger? And wondering how slow that could go? To where you couldn't understand speech anymore? 15/16 IPS? Probably something like that. Likely intended for dictation purposes or, Bible Stories? Where fidelity was of no concern. Because there could be nothing with this contraption. I venture to say. You're going to have problems finding 2 inch wide paper recording tape these days. Red barn paint will work just as well. It gets its red color from iron oxide. You pay that on paper. And then you drag that across 2 magnetic poles. While modulating the magnetism on the polls. While superimposing a very high frequency carrier over top. So high you can't hear it. But dogs can. And they will wonder why you are listening to such a stupid song? Only one note. Even dogs can hear more than one note. So can birds and cats. Turtles? I'm not so certain? We will not be discussing Turtles here. But they were still a cool old rock group from the 1960s, nevertheless. And they did not play fast. They played slow rock 'n' roll. They were turtles. Tape recorders are cool gizmos. When they work right. Pieces of crap when they don't. RemyRAD

8:15 moving right switch made head go down.....

3:40 Just put down that darn camera already......Everything is better than these crappy shots....And it saves yourself a risk of damaging goods and is a lot easier....

I have a book "Evolution of the tape recorder" The paper belt look the same as one used in something called a Walkie Walkabout. The author had one he loaned to a doctor to retrieve data. By the way if you can find the book it is a great one!

Really interesting, never seen anything like that! Looks like it wants 2" tape! Is it rim drive or is there something special going on under those reels!? Maybe it is rim drive, but the reels don't have much tape so that doesn't matter if it plays smooth.

Looks like something where you'd need a crazy long play time, like for dictation or continuous background music.

Fascinating. I would be really interested in hearing what is actually on the paper tape.

This second part make me think even more that this mechanism is related to, inspired by or a precursor to the 4" mechanism in the Schaub Lorenz 5001 that Techmoan did a video about.

Some resemblance to Techmoans video "The unique 1960s Hi-Fi systems that became time capsules". For some reason I think that it looks half homebuilt. Can it be parts from another form factor, like a dictation machine, that has been placed in a custom enclosure by someone? Would be interesteing to se if there's any more clues behind that mic input.

Speaking of Techmoan,he show something with a similar tape and mechanism czcams.com/video/xE2GEmHque8/video.html

i have seen this somewhere before......

I would almost have to say 40's or earlier, this is very much some kind of prototype, especially seeing as it doesn't use a capstan

You can have that second missing lever knob 3D printed and just paint it black.

I love the museum of broadcasting! Very interesting machine! Would love to see it in action

Wau. Really interesting. First I thought it was a some kind of jukebox. 2” tape was available from 1956 when Ampex made the first ”real” video tape recorder. Perhaps somebody who worked there was able to get some tape. Or was this made for music recording for somebody who first played one instrument and then the secon etc. But how to replay all tracks together?

This is the coolest thing I've seen in quite some time. 1/4" microphone input, speaker output. Noise was an important issue. Hifi output though -- at least via the device itself, not a priority. But yet expensive 2" tape? Wonder what speed it runs at. Auto-rewind... happenstance, or important to capture everything in the same direction because it makes transfer easier? I wonder to what extent the medium of the 2 inch, 24 track tape was the starting point. I.e. the primary goal being to capture audio on that particular format. Either because the creator had access to that or their work involved/necessitated that format. Vs the goal being more general regarding simply recording sound. Capturing lots of sound. Capturing separate tracks. Repeated recording of something to aid in comparison? So mysterious.

Looks to me that they found the tape transport, and made the amplifier and stuffed it all into an old AM radio box. The heavy lead on the tube could be due to microphonics or they were afraid of the tube emitting x-rays?? Once you go to testing may say! Strange, as the sockets and connectors are riveted down as well as the caps, but were they all done the same way, or were the rivets hand done? With the coils and caps, did they have a tape bias system in the design as well? With the mods to the switch, I would think they had feedback problems? Hope you get it going!

I’m, thinking or guessing this may have been built as a prototype that never went into production as white lion as already said. I may be wrong but to me that seems like it may be the case

Please take my sub! these two videos were absolutely amazing, I'm looking forward it the rest of the adventure, perhaps it will be possible to listen what was on this tape. Thanks for sharing this discovery

I want to listen to this video a lot. There is a clicking or scratching noise coming from the mic that is terribly distracting to me. I will reload the window to make sure my system isn't flushy, but the crackle is a no-go. Especially for an audio channel.

That tape recorder remind me of a device Techmoan revisited czcams.com/video/xE2GEmHque8/video.htmlsi=rwRcDuuYDwgUEW9W

Buy a damn tripod.

I've been involved in professional audio for over 46 years and I have never seen 3 inch wide tape. You learn something new everyday. Thanks for showing this to us.

In the 70's I worked at a recording studio that had been in business since the 40's. When a piece of equipment was taken out of service it was just taken up to the attic and left to gather dust. There was some cool old stuff up there. I did see something that looked kind of like this although there was no telling what recording medium it used. It had multiple track selection, hubs about that size, two heads (I'm assuming erase and record/play), a much bigger chassis and there was a screw adjustment in the back that apparently was used to adjust bias. I asked one of the old timers and he said it was probably a logging recorder. I would have been used to continuously monitor broadcasts (civilian or military, no telling) over long periods of time by rewinding and changing tracks. So there would be gaps in the recording where that operation took place, not unlike a basic cassette deck. It didn't appear to be reversible, although I suppose the reels could just have been flipped. The other cool thing up there was a triple record lathe that was used to record live broadcasts on 16" acetates. These acetates (usually big band shows emanating from nearby hotel ballrooms, etc.)would be played back (just once) every hour and sent down conditioned phone lies to stations in each of the time zones to the west, thus giving the listener the impression that they were listening to a live broadcast in whatever time zone. That old timer had operated that lathe for that purpose back when.

how many tracks on the 3 In wide tape? just curious . . . .