ClydeSight Productions has been restoring vintage tape recorders and making a video record of them as part of an extensive educational project on YouTube since late 2007. This article is about the work they are doing, and why they feel it is so important.

In the 1960's audio fans had only one way to capture audio - the magnetic tape recorder. At the time, in the United States, the market was flooded with Japanese machines, from AIWA, SONY, PANASONIC (Matsushita), SANYO and others. In Europe, GRUNDIG, UHER, TELEFUNKEN, TANDBERG and others were equally hard at work in the home audio market. The result was an amazing technological treasure of genius.

There was no sharing of design, no universal license (this came with Philips' introduction of the compact cassette mechanism in the late 1960's) so the engineers were free to exercise their imagination and creativity in the design of these machines. Tape recorders were of one style, reel to reel, until the cassette recorder hit the market and took it by storm. And who can forget those ubiquitous 8-track cartridge tapes?

All manufacturers no matter where they were, faced a common problem… how to get the sound of a symphony onto a ¼-inch ribbon of plastic tape. The way they did it is a lesson in human ingenuity and imagination.

For most of the vintage machines, it was done by "Capstan Drive" which moves the tape over the play head at a constant speed. The alternative, "Rim Drive", powered the take up tape reel directly from a motor, dragging the tape past the p;ayback head, and the result was a very unstable speed, unsuitable for music. "Rim Drive" is still used today in some "dictation" recorders since music reproduction is not required, and rim drive is cheaper to build than capstan drive.

While not all machines from this time period were of the best quality, they all did have pleasing designs meant to attract the eye, if not the ear. Remarkably, even today, some of the WORST performing machines produced in the 60's have become valuable collector's items!There is a line of tape recorders made by MINY that always get bids on E-Bay, as do machines made by MayFair. Both are "rim drive" tape recorders, with cheap amplifiers and terrible sound (even when restored). But somehow, they find a place in collector's hearts.

The Toll of Time

Sadly, time has taken its toll. Most tape recorders from the time period were designed to last about 10 years. Yet, today, more than 40 years later, they are still around, found in basements, attics and garages. Thanks to yard sales, and E-Bay (the world's largest yard sale!) they become available to anyone.

Some of these vintage tape recorders can be restored, but some can never be made to work again -- due to the deterioration of parts, most notably oxidation of rubber (which makes it hard and inflexible) and eventual failure of the little motors many of the portable machines used.

But some machines were well stored and did not suffer from oxidation. Those tape recorders that can be restored involve some amount of work, replacement of belts, idler wheels, electrolytic capacitors (which are notorious for failing) and of course need a good cleaning and lube job. When they run and 'speak' once more, there is a thrill of living history brought back to life!

Regardless of the restorable condition of a vintage tape recorder, one thing stands out. It is the design that matters, and design can be timeless. A Mayfair "rim drive" portable tape recorder won a design award in the late 1960's from the Museum of Modern Art in New York City! Today, collectors seek out the few machines that remain (whether they work or not) because something in the design speaks to the heart.

Even a dead tape recorder has a tale to tell.

ClydeSight Productions got into this arena when their neoclassical composer-in-residence, Tim Thompson, found a vintage Wollensak 5750 stereo tape recorder on E-Bay and offered to restore it if they would make a video record of the progress. The result was not only a restored tape recorder (which plays and records even today) but a video record for YouTube, a Web site devoted to the project, and the start of a Virtual Vintage Tape Recorder Museum. Since then, Tim has restored over 50 vintage machines (reel to reel and cassette) and ClydeSight Productions has recorded the progress on video and posted them on YouTube in their ClydeSight Channel. (see link at bottom of page)

"We quickly discovered that there are many audio fans out there who hunger for knowledge of these machines. In our videos, the goal is more than to show the recorder off, the controls and so on, it is to show HOW the machines work, looking under the hood at the internal mechanism and electronics to teach people about the machines and display the engineering ingenuity that each has. We found that many young people are fascinated by this old technology, and appreciate the education that these videos provide."

While Tim and ClydeSight Productions focus on small reel to reel recorders (with reel sizes ranging from 2-inches to 5-inches) they also provide videos on vintage cassette recorders, recognizing the importance that the compact cassette had in that time period, and indeed continues to have today. To make the videos interesting, they have focused on the unusual, the machines that people are not collecting; the one's that are overlooked or lost.

One example is the Telectro - MR511B, a battery powered 3-inch reel to reel machine that requires SEVEN AA batteries to run. They chose it for its unusual design and engineering. It is remarkable in that is has a solid brass capstan flywheel, a design absolutely unheard of at the time. It is one of their favorite machines and represents the quality of Telectro products before the company closed down, beaten by the competition. This machine was so important to Tim that he made THREE videos to explain it!

Another machine that almost defies description is the DEUS - Model E-630 a 3-inch reel to reel tape recorder that runs upside down and backwards! Like the Telectro machine, it has a solid brass flywheel and in spite of its strange design and age, it was restorable and still records and plays today.

In the cassette arena, when looking for the unusual, there are the STANDARD Model SR-100 and the Emerson Model TR-10 -- similar machines, probably both made by the Standard Radio Company of Japan (who, interestingly, produced the original MARANTZ electronic equipment). What makes these machines unusual is that they did not use the Philips licensed design for a cassette tape transport, but struck out on their own by modifying the design of a STANDARD Model SR-200 reel to reel recorder -- a tiny 2-inch reel to reel machine that still plays today! It was a very compact unit that used special high density tapes, allowing the machine to record a full hour on a single tape, something almost unheard of in most tiny reel-to-reel tape recorders of the 1960's.

Says Tim of the ClydeSight Productions Virtual Tape Recorder Museum project, "I think this is a valuable asset to the Internet community and it is wonderful that YouTube provides a platform for these videos. We have fun making them. I narrate all of them, but sometimes, I get to "ham it up" and put in a silly introduction that grabs the audience. This is important because we want them to learn from these videos. Many people don't even know what a tape recorder is; some have never seen one. The technology has been mostly abandoned in the public sector, although professional tape recorders still exist in industry, police stations, doctor's offices, radio stations etc. But the general public hardly gets to see them anymore. We wanted not only to show them off, but to show the amazing ingenuity that went into their design. For us it's not just 'Does it work?'-- it's 'HOW does it work?' That's what we try to provide."

ClydeSight Productions further adds, "We don't have the physical space or building to house a true vintage tape recorder museum, although we would love to create such a place for the public. It is just not feasible, even if we were to find funding for such a project. The costs would be enormous, the staffing required, the energy used, it just isn't a practical proposition. That's why we are so grateful for YouTube, and we hope Google understands what a great benefit their YouTube provides to the public. For some it is a chance to show off, and for others, like us, it is a chance to educate and inspire.

Thanks to YouTube and other video sites, we have looked to the future and used the power of the Internet to reach out to the world at large, which in a way is probably much better than a physical facility. Thanks to YouTube (Google) and other video sites (which pick up our videos and carry them) the entire world can see these machines anytime they like, day or night, through the power of their computers. They don’t have to travel any farther than their keyboard!"

ClydeSight Productions reports that they have received a number of kudos and thanks from the viewing public, not only through the comments section of their videos (which receive 4 and 5 star ratings) but through e-mails and You Tube Private Messages.

"We were very touched by one e-mail. A woman wrote to us that her father had recently passed away and she had been in terrible grief. Somehow, she found us on YouTube, and looked at some of our videos. She then remembered that she had an old tape recorder and tapes that her father made, sitting in the attic. She got the machine, cleaned it up and got it working, and played the tapes-- the messages her father had left while he was still alive. She thanked us for our inspiration, for it helped her manage the terrible sense of loss she had been experiencing. Others tell us that they find the videos inspiring and educational, that they had no idea about this old technology and what it meant."

We live in a world of technological wonders, much of which is managed by our magnificent computers. Music recording is now primarily done on CD and in MP3 format. There are, of course, great benefits these provide, fantastic sound, convenience, easy of use, simplicity.

But none of this could have happened without those pioneers of 40+ years ago, the engineers in the many companies, US, Japanese and European, that designed and built the early tape recorders and fired the public's imagination with the joy of home recording. The legacy they left is often an unsung song. Thanks to the work of Tim, ClydeSight Productions and other audio fans, many of whom post videos on YouTube, that legacy will not be forgotten.

Sometimes, it is good to look back. For when we look back at where we have been, we can better appreciate what it took to get us to where we are, and where we are going.