Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Mellotronists

----- Original Message -----
From: "Markus Resch" <markusr@...>
To: <Mellotronists@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, October 22, 2005 7:04 PM
Subject: [Mellotronists] Tape widths


Markus/all

> In some machines the rollers need to be tightened a bit harder to
compensate
> for the slightly reduced drive of the black matte tapes, but the machines
> that have this problem (very hard and non-gripping rollers due to aged
> rubber) need new rollers anyway. THAT is the big improvement, the marginal
> difference between the tapes is totally negligeable compared to the vast
> improvement with new rollers in these machines.

When Änglagård used #1145 in Belgium in summer '03, tapes were switched
around between machines. Towards the end of the set, after much heat, smoke
etc., a set of Markus' tapes installed in my machine slipped horrendously,
to the amusement of all and sundry, and my utter horror. I've since decided
the reason was my fairly knackered old rollers - a few have now been
replaced, and the whole lot have been ground my Martin/John to a tyre shape,
which really does work as well as they say. I've used it at four gigs this
year, with its standard late '70s tapeset, and have had no problems
whatsoever. Markus is quite right about pinch rollers - replace or grind, I
say.

Andy T.