Library wind on Revox C270

[cbcampbell]

Hello all,

This is my first post here. I have substantial experience with open-reel recorders, having begun using a Tandberg and then a Nagra for field work along with a variety of studio decks for documentary and multi-image projects with my father as a teenager in the 1970s. I am now an artist (painter, photographer), but am still involved with audio, and currently engaged in beginning to digitize an archive of some six hundred tapes of spoken voice from the late 1950s and 1960s. Equipment-wise, I'm using an Otari MX-5050 BIII-2 to play back a handful of 1/4 track tapes, but the primary deck is a Studer Revox C270 1/2 track deck which I purchased in 1991. From the C270, I'm doing a 24/96 A/D conversion via Apogee Duet to MacPro, editing in BIAS Peak Pro 6.

I have long been familiar with the practice of storing tapes tails out, after playback at normal speed, so as to produce the flattest and smoothest tape wind possible. However, in studying the written material for the C270, I have discovered three references to an actual "library wind" function that I had never noticed previously:

1. Sales brochure. Listed in the original sales brochure for the C27x series, under "Transport Functions," as one of the machine's functions is:

• Selectable library wind

2. Operating Instructions. In the C270 operating instructions, on page 32, the possible settings of the DIP switches are listed.

Nr 3 — ON — Library mode wind on
Nr 3 — OFF — Normal operation, library mode wind off

3. Service Manual. In the full C270 service manual, on page 3/2, is found the most detailed reference to the function of DIP switch 3:

The following operation parameters can be programmed on the 8-bit DIP switch (SZ1):

S3 ON = Library wind activated, adjustable with potentiometer (RA4)
S3 OFF = No library wind

Given the precision with which these recorders were designed and built, it seems unlikely that all three of these references to this special function would be in error. The problem is that we have hardware and documentation related to "library wind" — even a reference to which potentiometer to adjust to control its speed — but not a word anywhere else about how to actually engage or activate it!

While an absolutely lovely deck, the C270 is slightly an odd duck, standing somewhere between the Revox and Studer families, nearly at the end of the development line. I know that on a number of full-fledged Studer decks one could touch the "Shift" key, and then a transport key to engage a slowed/library wind, but of course the C270 does not have a shift key, so perhaps it shares some parts and was intended to share some functions with decks like the A807, but this feature was never fully realized on the C27x series?

Recently, I have made attempts to get information both from current Revox/Studer service facilities in Switzerland, as well as from Revox/Studer service experts in the USA, but so far this feature seems to have flown under the radar. I have a lot of delicate tape handling ahead of me, so if anyone has any information or leads to pursue, I would be most appreciative.
-----
Christopher Campbell
http://www.cbcampbell.com

[Administrator]

Hello Christopher,

I´m not sure... But could it be that you have to press the "Trans" button together with the button for spooling?
This is the way on the STUDER A810. There is also a "Trans" button. And if you press "Trans" and "Spooling", the machine goes in archive winding mode...

What do you think about it?

Or in German for the other members:

Mit welcher Tastenkombination kann Christopher bei seiner C270 die Archivwickelfunktion nutzbar machen nachdem er dieses Feature grundsätzlich intern aktiviert hat??? Ist es wie bei der A810 Trans + spulen?

Best regards,

[erich]

Hello Christopher,

when you set the DIP switch number 3 to ON, you must have
a reduced wind speed, if you only press rewind or fastforward.

The potentiometer ( RA4 ), which is only desribed in the english
version of the servicemanual, I also havent´t found.

At the moment, I have no C270 to test this functions, but I think, we
must have anyone in this forum, who can do this.

best regards

Erich Schleicher

[cbcampbell]

Well, last night I decided to try to sort out this question of a library wind more or less definitively, so I pulled the C270 from its rolling console, removed the rack rails and cage, and studied the DIP switches. Somewhat to my surprise, changing the position of SW 3, the one that supposedly enables/disables library wind, made absolutely no difference in the apparent rewind/fast forward speeds (and I was careful to switch off the power whenever I changed settings so that the system had the opportunity to take account of the switch change). This suggests to me that Arian Jansen, a Studer/Revox owner in Los Angeles, was correct in recently informing me that the feature was never fully realized. It also suggests that I would only have seen a difference if I had changed the setting of the RA4 potentiometer, but I didn't want to go that far. The tape handling on the C270 is already excellent, and for most of the tapes I'll be digitizing, simply playing them off to the right will be perfectly adequate. Thanks to Christoph and Erich for their assistance.

[peteroli]

I reopen this thread today because of my "new" Studer C270.
I´ve switched the dip to library wind and set the speed to about 5 m/s. When I wind or rewind there ist a beautiful tape on the reel. If I want spool faster, I can do it with the z-loc or a-loc. In this case the spooling takes the faster normal speed.