Re: [ARSCLIST] How to determine the state of tapes?

[Aaron Michael Bittel <ambittel@xxxxxxx>]

Maurice,

I found these two resources from AES to be useful this past summer for  
a project where I was assessing a collection of field tapes:

http://www.aes.org/aeshc/docs/3mtape/aorintr1.html
http://www.aes.org/aeshc/basftapedoc.html

As has been pointed out, experience is the best tool for identifying  
tape types and problems.  Lacking that (extensive experience with  
tape), I found these charts to be helpful in making some educated  
guesses about what it was I was dealing with.  From that point, I  
could do more research to find the known problems with the product  
number(s) I thought I had.  In one case, these charts helped me  
discover that a couple of the tapes were actually PVC, and on further  
research I learned that PVC tapes are prone to shredding under tension.

- Aaron

*************************
Aaron M. Bittel
Graduate Assistant, Belfer Audio Archive
Syracuse University
Syracuse, NY