U-matic tapes and sticky shed

There has been a discussion about this in the New Scientist during the
past few weeks. Two solutions have been offered. The first, to wipe the
tape with IPA, which apparently works for some. Another solution (from
memory) was to freeze the tape and tape heads with Freon (unsound
environmentally), and in order to avoid condensation and icing up of the
mechanism, to enclose the tape assembly in a polystyrene box and purge
it with cold (cycled through a fridge) nitrogen. The IPA wipe method
came from Watson of DNA fame.

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 7:85
                  Distributed: Wednesday, May 25, 1994
                        Message Id: cdl-7-85-005
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