cassetthead tuning?

[Figge]

if there is some one familiar with service of cassettdecks please help out. been fixing up a 3 head machine seems to work great exept for the heads seems too need some calibration. someone has been screwing with it. theres 3 screws all with springs, so i would like to know how this is done correctly. i bought the deck because i have 100:s of old tapes i wanted to bring out of the basement.

the deck is a akai GX912

[duaneage]

You need an azmith tape. It has a precision 6.3 khz tone that is used to align the heads so they are parallel with the tape. I have one and calibrate my decks before transfering tapes to mp3

If you did not live so far away i would let you borrow it but I use it regularly and cannot be without for long.

Try ebay. TEAC made them for years. They also made a 1000hz tape for adjusting the speed (I have this one as well) and also a torque tape for checking how strong the clutches were on the reels.

[Figge]

thanx alot for your input! i can see why u dont want to send me the tapes. the only tape i found on ebay was for commodore 64:D LOL i remember those! man the computers has gotten better the last 20 years!

i will look for the tapes. i was at a local repairshop and asked about my problem and the guy said they used a music tape and tuned til it sounded nice. Allright!

now the second place i was at said the same thing! im lycky i didnt leave the deck for tuning at these guys.

[Alex Lancaster]

:) Hi Duane!, I think You mean Azimuth, which is an angle, maybe You could copy the tapes.


Figge: You can align the heads with music, but it will take hours, and You don´t know if it is right.

Years ago I wore down a Concord open reel, 7", with too many adjustments, all the time.

Since CD's came out, I haven´t fooled around with tapes.

Good luck.

[Zilch]

:) Hi Duane!, I think You mean Azimuth, which is an angle, maybe You could copy the tapes.If you copy the tapes, the alignment will be that of the recording head of the device used to make the copy, not necessarily the standard alignment.... :(

[Figge]

anyone know the content on the C-64 azimuth tape? it says on the manual for the cassette "suitable for the Commodore C2N Cassette deck....?

as long as theres a tone on it it should work right?

[duaneage]

:) Hi Duane!, I think You mean Azimuth, which is an angle, maybe You could copy the tapes.


Figge: You can align the heads with music, but it will take hours, and You don´t know if it is right.



Good luck.

Note the posting time , the author is not responsible for grammer, content or spelling after 12 AM.

I still have the very first cassette recorded on one of my decks. I use it for a reference tape sometimes rather than the 6.3khz as a quick check.

[Figge]

well lets say i get the test tape, how do i use it? i mean the rec and play heads sits together in one piece, and theres 2 spring screws on the left side and 1 on the right, the one on the right is azimuth.

cant ask my local repairshops obviously.

[duaneage]

First off, the heads are probably not far out, if at all. you may find they are close enough and leave thm alone. move only a little bit at a time to keep from losing the adjustment all together. The proper way is to use an oscilloscope to check that the left and right channels are in phase. I have found that with a pair of headphones you can tell when the output is brightest and centered. It will be clear when they are in phas, no pun intended.
One of the screws is to be left alone. It is mounted to a fixed plate. The other screw is spring loaded and that is the adjuster.

The rec play heads are usually mounted together. If yours are different then you need to adjust the playback head first and then use a test tone to adjust the recording head while it is monitoring.

I sometimes tweak the adjustment on tapes recorded on other decks. I playback the tape and adjust the azimuth until I get the best HF response. Having the test tapes allows me to go back when I am done.

The decks I use are a pair of TEAC AD-670 , also known as a TASCAM 103