The "Picture of your Reel-To-Reel(s)" thread

Some had 8-Tracks built in

 

My Christmas gift, Akai GX-265D

 

The old Akai?

 

This is a buttons champ for an open-reel deck - with more buttons than any decks I have ever seen ...

 

The New Akai

 

I only have the baby Akai - GX-77. My big decks are the Tandberg and Revox ...

 

Been meaning to post a photo, and tonight I was using the thing to transfer a couple of tapes (should have taken the shot with the 10" one, but didn't think of it until too late), so...

Ampex AG-440 with AG-440B electronics. The headstack cover is off right now because I had to get in there to swap out feed from the half track head to feed from a 1/4 track head that I had installed when I got the thing. The black box below it is a Teac AN-80 outboard Dolby B unit. The box sitting on top is an Ampex wired remote control.

 

Wow drh! That looks like a sweet machine!

 

One of the original open-reel decks by Ampex, which is now solely in the video business or making money just by collecting royalties on its many patents. This machine must be at least 30 year-old if not older. Machines of such quality are just not made anymore. My sister recently has the motor of her $2000 made-in-Mexico frig conked out on her in under a year, go figure.

 

Thanks! Yes, it's an absolute work horse, and yes, it's probably more than 30 years old. One of my better bargains--the father of one of my wife's piano students arranged for me to haul it away from his workplace, where it was just sitting after going out of service some years earlier (if memory serves, it had spent its active life there recording talking books for the blind). I had the heads relapped and that 1/4 track added, and an Ampex loving friend, who had the appropriate test tapes, set up the bias and whatnot for optimum performance with a specific grade of tape that of course is now no longer in production. When I got it, it was in a roll-around about the size of a tank. A couple of years ago, I removed it and mounted it in a home-built audio rack. The sad part of the story: the student's parents split up not long after, and she quit taking lessons. Nice folks all, and talented kid, too; I guess she's probably through college by now. I never look at that machine but I think of her and wonder what became of them.

All that said, I'll admit I get a real charge out of thinking that I own a machine very like the ones on which so many fine recordings were mastered.

 

Makes me want one!

 

It is far easier to find a Revox than to find a Crown or Ampex open-reels from the 70's.

 

I owned one of those Pioneers I never should have let go.

 

Like this one?

 

Or this one?

 

My first open reel was the TEAC 3440. Loved it. Eventually moved up to Tascam 388

 

I had the 2340, the little brother to the 3340 for six months. Then I sold it to my high school buddy who was into guitar playing and thereby could use the multi-sync, 4-channel, track-over-track features available in both the 2340 and 3340. The deck was a great deck but a bad fit for me since I was no musician ...

 

hey anyone got a Teac 3300 2T they want to sell?

 

Nice 4-channel Akai deck. Back in the early to mid 70's, just about every major Japanese audio manufacturer had 4-channel open-reel deck model on the market.

 

I am loving all these pictures~! Great thread.

I'll have to dig out my RTR and see what it is and take a picture. I received it from my grandparents when they moved back in 1985, when I was 15 years old. I remember my astonishment when I found out I could double track things like vocals and instruments, or use the vari-speed to talk real slooow and make our own "chipmunk" recordings with friends, lol.

I also inherited some pre-recorded reels from my parents (I remember they included Herb Albert & the Tijuana Brass) plus some reels that they had recorded themselves, including an audio recording off of the TV of a Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour show from either 1967 or 1968, and tapes of my brother when he was a baby. I bought blank tape to record "Live Aid" from over the air, but even in 1985 tape was very hard to find and extremely expensive.

Thanks for all the great pictures

 

Two vintage Crown that are now on their way to a new home. Lovely decks- I just didn't have the need for more audio gear right now.

Cheers,
RW

 

The Crown open-reel deck was built like a tank ...

 

You Got That Right!

That 1400 weighs a solid 100 lbs. Combined with the weight and size of reels- it takes dedication to to use the format.

Consider... one of my employees came in with an ipod nano (or something) Holds 8000 songs and looks the size of a matchbook. Wow. It even sounds OK through the little ear buds.

 

Great pics.

 

I know where you can get a TEAC A-4300SX for $225...