Tape repair and recovery
Stored correctly, magnetic tape will probably outlast its recordable optical counterpart, DVD. But tape is not going to last forever and the number of machines available to play these tapes is finite, and to further complicate the issue, the people with the necessary knowledge and skills to maintain these machines are few and far between, the sooner tapes are digitized, the better.
We’ve recovered tapes that were thought to be unrecoverable, some notable examples – audio tapes from a house fire and VHS tapes submerged in water after flooding.
With over 30 years of experience working with magnetic tape we have learned a few lessons and have developed and perfected various techniques to clean and recover tape.
Tape Cleaning and treatment
This gallery is a small sample of some of the tapes we’ve cleaned and successfully digitized. In some cases, we have transferred the magnetic tape to new cases or reels to successfully digitize the material.
We have specialist tape splicing blocks, custom built jigs and other equipment specifically designed and built to clean and splice magnetic tape.
Tape baking
In extreme cases we bake tapes over a prolonged period of time and at a constant temperature and humidity level. This process extracts excess moisture and helps release the bonds created by mould on the edges of the tape thus making it easier to clean.
Mould or moisture in-between the layers of tape can bond the layers together making a successful recovery more challenging.
Success rates
We have a very high overall success rate with recovering and digitizing damaged tapes, this is very dependent on the extent of the damage. Thicker tape such as VHS, Betamax, DAT and audio tape has a very high success rate, whilst thinner tape such as DV and 8mm have a slightly lower success rate. We have successfully cleaned and recovered damaged tapes such as Betacam SP, 8mm video, DV, DVCPRO 25, VHS, SVHS, VHS C, Betamax, audio cassette and micro cassette.
Read the DVCPRO Challenge post where we successfully recovered a batch of damaged DVCPRO tape with a near 100% recovery rate.
Splicing
A precision splicing block is used to ensure the tape is perfectly aligned before the splicing tape is applied.
Splicing of tape is not always ideal and can cause damage if not done correctly, this can cause damage to the playback equipment, especially when working with digital formats and delicate machines. In such cases we will manually respool the good sections of tape onto new supply reels and digitize the tape in short sections. Badly damaged or creased sections of tape are removed to prevent damage to the VTR’s.
Ultimately, it’s a trade off – is the tape worth it and is a partial recovery better than none.
Cassette cases
We carry stock of most cassette casings, if you have a damaged case, we can relocate your take up and supply spools into the new case and get the tape working.
Contact us for pricing on this service. This service is not offered as a standalone service – we only clean and treat tapes if we are doing the transfer to digital files – the reason – we run our machines with covers off so in the event of an issue we can react and prevent damage. It’s near impossible to get the tapes 100% clean and there will always be residual dust so we cannot offer any guarantees of any kind.
Cassette storage and long-term care
Tape should be stored in a cool, dry place. Use silica gel packs or similar.