Part Two of Technics Mod

MylesBAstor · Aug 7, 2011

Charlie King was gracious enough to come over today and do part two of the mods to my Technics 1500. Charlie put a Pro Nortronics narrow gap head in the Technics headblock, aligned it and then checked FR. In addition, I opted to bypass the 2/4 track switch as really have no interest in 4 track tapes

Again, less in the signal path!

Here are some pics of the deck now.

So far so good

The new PB heads are far, far better than the stock heads. Better extension at both extremes and resolution. So far what I find shocking is the depth and tightness of the bass! Going to play them for a week and let them break in a little as Charlie suggested.

Part 3 will come in a month or so when replace the Mundorf with Dueland caps. Charlie will probably also take out the output cap - -as Mike L. suggested -- no cap is better than any cap.

RogerD · Aug 7, 2011

Hi Myles,

Hot rodding the KC 1500 with Duelands eh.....

Now that should be awesome! Nice and thx for the pics.

mep · Aug 7, 2011

MylesBAstor said:
Charlie will probably also take out the output cap - -as Mike L. suggested -- no cap is better than any cap.

...unless you need that cap.

MylesBAstor · Aug 7, 2011

mep said:
...unless you need that cap.

Nope

MylesBAstor · Aug 7, 2011

OK resized before uploading. For some reason, the downsizing option doesn't work.

Tom B. · Aug 7, 2011

Surprised that you canned quarter-track playback, considering the vast amount of decent tapes available in that format. Admittedly two-track wins by most accounts, but some of the 4-trk media makes for good listening.

Tom B.

mep · Aug 7, 2011

Tom-It sounds good, it's just noisy as hell.

Tom B. · Aug 7, 2011

Do you feel that's true of all quarter-track recordings or just many/most, in general? Obviously the quality of those consumer tapes runs the gamut, but I've not taken particular notice of the noise on my 7.5 IPS tapes. I even went all out and had JRF modify my A80 headblock for switchable 2-trk ~ 1/4-trk playback; the addition of a Flux head giving a big boost in playback of quarter track media.

Tom

mep · Aug 7, 2011

Tom B. said:
Do you feel that's true of all quarter-track recordings or just many/most, in general? Obviously the quality of those consumer tapes runs the gamut, but I've not taken particular notice of the noise on my 7.5 IPS tapes. I even went all out and had JRF modify my A80 headblock for switchable 2-trk ~ 1/4-trk playback; the addition of a Flux head giving a big boost in playback of quarter track media.

Tom

Tom-Many/most are noisy. When the music is going full-tilt boogie, you don't notice it. When things quiet down, it stands out. Recording on both sides of the tape pretty much guarantees that.

Tom B. · Aug 7, 2011

mep said:
Tom-Many/most are noisy. When the music is going full-tilt boogie, you don't notice it. When things quiet down, it stands out. Recording on both sides of the tape pretty much guarantees that.

Well, we record on the same side of the tape, but the tracks are interleaved 1,3 2,4 and less magnetic saturation due to smaller track width. But I appreciate your note and am going to dig out some quiet (read:classical, not my typical jazz, Latin, blues) tapes and try to take note of the noise. Perhaps I've just not noticed before....

Tom

RogerD · Aug 7, 2011

Not to start a food fight here,but a surprising amount of 4 tracks especially classical and jazz are very enjoyable,quiet,good sounstage width and depth,ect.. The noise part on these tapes are a non issue. Right now I'm listening to a John Williams-Rodruigo tape and it is flat stunning. I listened to a Simon garfunkle, Parsley sage? tape last night and it also sounds great. This hangup about 4 track I just don't understand because most 2 tracks available to the masses were recorded between 1958-62 and is mostly classical. That's leaving out the majority of music and why???

mep · Aug 7, 2011

Roger-I find them enjoyable also. I just find them to be noisy in general. The better machines with optimum head alignment will minimize the noise.

RogerD · Aug 7, 2011

Someday Mark you should get yourself a Ampex 440,upgrade the cards and experience a exceptional studio deck. The one thing about the 440 series is that they have ouststanding stock heads and the heads are the heart of any RTR.

Tom B. · Aug 7, 2011

Myles,

Sorry to have gone OT from your original post.....looking forwards to Part 3 of your Technics mods.

Tom

mep · Aug 7, 2011

Roger-Are you suggesting the 440 for 4 track tapes or to replace my Otari MX-55 mastering deck?

MylesBAstor · Aug 7, 2011

Tom B. said:
Myles,

Sorry to have gone OT from your original post.....looking forwards to Part 3 of your Technics mods.

Tom

No problem, I do it all the time. Leads to some fruitful discussions. No need to have a hall monitor

RogerD · Aug 7, 2011

mep said:
Roger-Are you suggesting the 440 for 4 track tapes or to replace my Otari MX-55 mastering deck?

Hi Mark,

Keep your Otari and add a 440 to the fleet.

You would need a 2TPBR4TPB headstack but they do come up on ebay now and then.

Both me and Rich have them.

DonH50 · Aug 8, 2011

IIRC, crosstalk/print-through are also much worse on 4-track recordings. I used to play a classical piece with very large, sudden dynamic contrasts (a nice recoridng of Pictures, just something I happen to like, listening or performing) and you could clearly hear the feedthrough in the sudden quiet passages after the big crashes in "Gate". It was a good test because the preamp outputs were split to two decks, a two-track ML-modified Studer and a Studer (I think) four-track, so both got the same signal (as best we could match). Alas, I no longer have the tapes or the decks...

Jayeltex · Jan 7, 2012

Myles...Some questions if I may....
What's your feeling so far on the Pro Nortronics head ? I had John French install a 2 track Flux head on the 4 track side and a brand new Technics head on the 2 track side (it's like having 2 tone arm options). Also how do you like the King/Cello ? How does it compare to the TP Eros tape head preamp ?
I'm always interesting in moving up. Love to have your comments
thanks
jay

c1ferrari · Jan 7, 2012

Me, too...

MylesBAstor said:
No problem, I do it all the time. Leads to some fruitful discussions. No need to have a hall monitor

Fruitful discussions have ensued, here

Congrats on the KC tape pre, Myles!

Part Two of Technics Mod

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