Sony U-Matic 5800 head cleaning?

Hi folks!
I work for a government/community access station in Pasadena. As part of our new archiving project -a huge archive dating from 1989- we are using a Sony U-matic 5800 to transfer 3/4" inch tapes to digital files. I am concerned about the eventual wearing down of playback heads. Is there a formula or process to effectively clean the heads?

Watching city archives is a blast, and I think this project will actually attract viewership to our site and channel.

 

I use chamois and a bottle of dichlorodifluoromethane (which was outlawed in 1995.) It's the most effective, but alcohol can work, but do NOT use rubbing alcohol as it has oil in it.

The heads are located just above the gap between the stationary tape guide as part of the spinning head. I use chamois because it has no fibers. Make sure you only move in the direction of the gap NOT up and down.


(The above picture is of a VHS head stack, but they are pretty much the same except for size.)

By the way, I used to own a 5800 and dumped it when I got a JVC CR-850 editing machine. The 5800 was the budget player and I always felt it was a bit harsh on the tapes, clunking from stop to full speed. Full editing machines had much gentler tape handling. You might be able to pick up a really excellent 3/4" machine really cheap or free, ideally one with a built in Time Base Corrector.

 

Yep, what Chris says. You can't use rubbing alcohol, but you can use isopropyl alcohol. All of the VO- series machines were clunky and plasticky; the BVU series was the powerhouse that was extremely well-made and did hold up for a long time. I don't think you can get them for free, but you can get them very affordably on eBay. The problem is finding one with heads that aren't already ground down like sandpaper.

 

I've been advised that isopropyl alcohol on a piece of plain white printer paper is a safe and effective method for cleaning video heads. As mentioned already, wipe with the gaps not across them.

 

Ah where to begin? I used to use a Sony Betamax for mastering years ago, and have to say it held up very well until the point when I no longer needed it. And I bought it used.

First thing I'd do is mark one of the 3/4" recordings to use a reference tape. That way, after say... 1000 tape transfers, you can record a few minutes of the reference tape again to see if there's any degradation of the video signal. If it's blurrier, well then you know it's time for a little servicing. If the machine's in good condition, you ought to be able to get a lot of mileage out of it before anything dramatic is required.

The other thing to keep in mind is that the heads on the 5800 aren't made of polishable metal. They're ceramic ferrite, and that means that if you're too forceful with any cleaning effort and you chip the ceramic, your machine is toast. There are also guide pins that the tape moves along to position it across the record head, usually metal, and those get pretty gunked up with lots of use, so they need a good cleaning as well. The drum that holds the record heads is metal, and that gets crusty too. It's important to attend to those things, because that residue gets dragged across the heads if left unattended. I'll second what Chris said about the alcohol. I was able to get some pretty pure stuff from the local hardware store, and got some fiber free cleaning swabs from a local electronics store to do the cleaning with. They looked like Q-Tips, but were better for the servicing. I don't know if they still make those, but it's worth looking into.

The main thing to do, is avoid any commercial cleaning cassettes. They sure seem like an easy solution, but you never know what's on those things, and sometimes the cleaning compounds they use contain stuff that actually attracts residue to those all important surface areas faster than if they weren't cleaned at all. Chemical solvents or something that break down the oxide, or whatever it is on the tape. To be sure, I don't even know if they make cleaning cassettes any more... but even if you can find them somewhere, and they're touted as a specialty item for professional use, I wouldn't trust them.

Good luck with everything. I hope it works well for you.

 

The problem is that all paper is compressed fibers, and even the finest paper has the possibility of shedding fibers. I've had great luck with chamois because of the lack of fibers.

 

My Studio, Mass Productions recovers Umatic Videos every day. They are quite a challenge! You will also find that a number of tapes will be sticky or shedding oxide. These tapes will either come to a squealing stop, or will clog the heads in seconds. If you run into that, we can bake and clean your trouble tapes to Pro Res Digital Files.

As I write this, I am recovering some Umatics from 1977! I'm amazed we are getting the video off of them. We had to bake them for days and several cleaning cycles before we could get anything. In some cases I have to transfer the tapes in pieces, stopping to clean the head and capture a bit more, then edit the whole thing together.

 

TexWipes are what we traditionally used for video head cleaning, from at least the 1970s through the early 2000s...

The original solvent cleaner we used was Freon, which left no residue on the video head which was a good thing. Unfortunately, this chemical was eventually discontinued because it was eating up the ionosphere, so we started to use alcohol at some point in the early 2000s.