New Philips toy.

[PYE625]

Well I won this on ebay for a massive £13 and was quite pleased.....it's a Philips EL3452A reel to reel complete with microphone, instructions and some tapes.
Condition-wise, it seems to have had little use as there is no head wear and all the rubber components are good. Been stored in dry conditions I would think.
Only three caps (brown wima's) and she runs well after some minor lubrication in appropriate places.

On the tapes, well there is the top 20 of August 1968 with fluff Freeman, the Engelbert Humpadinck show, David Jacobs presenting Frank Sinatra at the Royal Festival Hall in 1970, an entire wedding ceremony from 1964 and then a family argument of all things !!

I did contact the local seller in case the items on the tape had any sentimental interest, but they belonged to his late stepfather and "have no sentimental interest whatsoever". So I guess it say's it all really.

[Cathovisor]

You're lucky you haven't got a sea of gooey rubber reverting to nature under the deck of that!

I was in a similar situation recently regarding the material that came with something: I got a slide projector from Greegle for its lenses as I'm thinking - one day! - of building a mirror-drum 'Televisor'. It came with several hundred slides and the whole thing was from an elderly lady living in a rather grand house, who was now downsizing due to bereavement. I mentioned the slides, and she just said "bin them".

The slides were of family holidays and the like from the 60s and 70s. I always find throwing that sort of stuff away: I always wonder about what the events were either side of that moment in time getting frozen for posterity. I was always fascinated by one such photo on my great-Aunt's mantelpiece, and I remember she told me long ago what it was, but I've long forgotten. I think I still have that photo as a memento of her.

I think the radio broadcasts are certainly worth digitising.

Here's a thought: why not hunt down various pieces of obscure audio kit and offer a "dead media" recovery service as a new business for yourself?

[crackle]

I have one of these, it has been in the family since the mid 1960's. It belonged to my sister and I used to use it occasionally. It is now in my collection and remarkably it is sill in perfect working condition, belts and all, or at least it was a couple of years ago when I last looked at it.
I think the belts on these tend to go hard and crack rather than soft and gooey.
The microphone I used with it was the same as the one with yours, but unfortunately my one has been lost over the years.
A nice quality well made recorder, not top of the class but very expensive in its day.
I think I have the operating instructions if you want an electronic copy.
This is a link to some photos of my one. http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/philips_el3542.html

Mike

[Rebel RafterMembership Retired]

Hi from RR. You'll probably already be aware of this but one thing I long ago discovered with old tape recorders is the old motors sometimes lack a bit of torque and tend to cause a kind of "water music" effect or "warbling" of the recordings and playback. When I was much younger I couldn't understand what caused it and I later discovered it was due to the motor as I sometimes found the same problem with some old 80's VHS machines and the cure was often far too expensive as the only cure was a new capstan motor which in those days were hugely expensive. I'm not sure what actually happens to the motors but I think it's a lack of torque but I could be wrong, I never really looked into it in depth. The same thing sometimes happens with 8 track cartridge decks too. It always seemed to happen wherever there was a motor driving a capstan with a big flywheel, as if the motor and the flywheel's momentum were competing with each other, but I don't know the real cause. Perhaps someone else could shed some light on the subject. RR.

[Terrykc]

One problem with these machines and their single speed cousins is a static build up on the belt that runs virtually all round the outside of the deck. It results in a random ticking, particularly when the deck is otherwise stationary with no audio output.

When we reported this problem to Philips, the response was to send us a pint can of Castrol graphite grease to put on all the bearings!

When I left the company a few years afterwards, the nearly full tin sat on one of the shelves. For all I know, it is still languishing in the workshop today - but nobody will know why it's there, let alone what it is for!

[Cathovisor]

One problem with these machines and their single speed cousins is a static build up on the belt that runs virtually all round the outside of the deck. It results in a random ticking, particularly when the deck is otherwise stationary with no audio output.

Hence the earthed brushes that the belt ran through on later machines.

[PYE625]

I spent my time very valuably this afternoon recording birdsong at 7 1/2 ips and playing it back at 1 7/8 ips.
It sounded like Jurassic Park ! The dog was none too impressed when I did the same with her barking lol

Anyway, it makes good recordings and the mic. is very sensitive.
Definitely not a Revox, but a nice machine well built all the same.

[Rebel RafterMembership Retired]

Hi from RR. Graphite grease is conductive just like copper grease that's used by mechanics as an anti-sieze agent, so in theory at least if you put some on the bearings it would help earth them and drain away the static. I don't like graphite grease as in my experience it goes hard and gums up the mechanisms it's supposed to lubricate. Mitsubishi used it in their time-lapse security VHS recorders and I had one a few years ago and it's deck kept getting stuck and I had the manual so I stripped it down and tried to fix it and I found graphite grease on all the little plastic gears and it had gone hard and was partially seizing it so I took them out one by one and cleaned and regreased them with a different grease and although Mitsubishi had tried to make the deck as foolproof as possible by making nearly all the parts fit only one way I still cocked it up and only ended up buggering it up altogether, I don't know what happened I must've missed something as it wouldn't run afterwards, it only jammed. But if it had a different grease I might not have had to strip it. Another problem I once had with a valve reel to reel reorder was because of the high input impedance I got interference from CB radio and I went to various CB shops to try and find a solution but they told me there was nothing they could provide to solve it. That machine looks like new inside just like some of the old 1950's TV sets I've seen. RR.