<< Magnetic fields from other instruments?>>
I once had a problem with the black midi controller that sat on one of your
machines at progwest. I went for that model (the evolution 49 key job, which
now has a more sophisticated mk249c incarnation, the grey job on y'r other
400 that night, with the 12 assignable controller knobs), because they were
very cheap and they were the right size to fit on a 400, leaving enough room
behind for our roland sh1000 (the only keyboard I have that's older than
1098). this cheap midi controller put a nasty midi-type chatter on the
'tron's output the first time I used it, but after I modified it's power
supply and volume control circuit, I tried it again and all was fine. mystery.
btw- why don't controller keyboards come (like mine are modified to be) so
that a) you can plug in a volume pedal and b) when you do, the on-board
volume control functions so as to limit the upper range of the pedal?
and guess where that idea came from.....
never had a gauss/maxwell type problem though.
>>As we all well know the Mellotron 400 was really designed to hold up
Minimoogs.<<
funny- I thought they were designed to hold up gigs.... or traffic.... or
studio sessions....
>>sometimes I move stuff around because I think that the right keyboard setup
will somehow inspire me to create that killer album<<
sometimes I move stuff around for the same sort of reason, but in my
relatively limited real-estate, the 400 stays in the same corner these days
because it fits and I can just get our an1x on top. it hangs over the edges a
bit but it looks ok. people have sat on it in studios once or twice too. what
do other owners park on their lids?
>>1/4" tape in a 3/8" machine?
Done it, seems to work.......the tape would wander around in the
combs.....Are there any of the fabled 1/4" combs out there? Did they come
with some kind of modified detent plate for the track
selector? How many other tricks are out there?<<
I have a set of the combs (thanks to streetly) and the modified 2-track
selector assembly, though I'd already modified 1098 in a strat-stylee so that
crossfades between adjacent tracks could be performed. the combs helped when
I was using 1/4" loops in the 'tron, but later we acquired a tapeset (ex-TD)
with a mixture of 1/4" & 3/8" and the 1/4" bits played fine with just the
tape-retention washers to keep the tapes straight. I think the
disproportionate back-tension helped; the 1/4" sound effects certainly zipped
back into the frame.
ken L may have made some combs from jpegs I sent him; ken, did this ever
happen? gene could easily do the same, I'd imagine.
>>I Am Afraid To Look At My Motor Brushes<<
ah. over to martin & john. I've never been further than the stall-fuses, or
spraying aerosol-oil into the bearings occasionally.
as for other tricks- first mod I did was the half-speed pull switch on the
pitch control. great on brass and church organ, and spooky on the choirs and
cello. origins of the idea lost in the proverbial mists, but I did this in
1991 shortly after acquiring the machine. if anyone knows of it being done
earlier (i.e. rather than just recording a normal 'tron at the wrong speed),
I'd be interested to hear.
duncan/400nr1098, currently supporting three disgraced emu samplers and their
useless syquest carts.