154 Boone Avenue, Gray, TN 37615, USA
2 Inch Quad Tape Transfer And Digitizing Services At AFFORDABLE prices
Specialist in 2 inch quad video tape restoration and digitization
using these machines pictured below
CAPABILITIES AND PRICES
STANDARDS
2 INCH QUAD TRANSFER PRICE LIST
2 INCH QUAD TRANSFER PRICE LIST
NTSC
PAL
PAL-M Brazil 3.575611
SECAM
405 British
525/60
625/50
7 1/2 IPS 5 mil tracks
15 IPS 10 mil tracks
Low Band Monochrome
Low Band Color
High Band Color
Super High Band Color
1 Channel Mono Audio
2 Channel Stereo Audio
Dolby A
other capabilities:
1 inch type C
3/4 inch Umatic cassettes
*COMING SOON*
IVC-9000 2 inch Helical in:
8ips, 4ips, NTSC and PAL standards
at the same price rates as 2 inch quad
2 INCH QUAD TRANSFER PRICE LIST
2 INCH QUAD TRANSFER PRICE LIST
2 INCH QUAD TRANSFER PRICE LIST
5 minute spot reel.......$20.00
10 minute spot reel.......$30.00
15 minute reel.................$48.00
30 minute reel.................$95.00
60 minute reel.................$125.00
90 minute reel.................$150.00
120 minute reel...............$175.00
TCR-100 Quad Cart.......$35.00
ACR-25 Quad Cart.........$35.00
Flange Glue removal......$45.00 per reel
*Tape Baking and Cleaning is included in the Transfer Price*
Blank or unplayable tape.....NO Charge
Preview a tape for content..NO Charge
NO Hourly Labor Charges
NO Minimum Order Charges
A 15% Non-Profit Org 501-C3 Discount is available with a valid State or Federal certificate of exemption.
A Bulk Discount Rate of $1.33 per running tape minute is available for large quantities.
Trade-ins are welcome. If you or your organization have old 2 inch equipment and/or parts, and if it is something I can use, they can be traded in for transfer work credit.
2 INCH QUAD EQUIPMENT
2 INCH QUAD TRANSFER PRICE LIST
2 INCH QUAD EQUIPMENT
AMPEX VTRS
3 AVR-1 NTSC-PAL-SECAM
3 AVR-2 NTSC-PAL-SECAM
2 AVR-3 NTSC HB-SHB-STEREO
1 VR-1200-C NTSC-PAL-SECAM
1 VR-1200-B NTSC-PAL-SECAM
1 VR-1200 NTSC-PAL-SECAM
1 VR-1200 PAL-M BRAZIL 3.575611
1 VR-1199 LBL COLOR & TBC-800
1 VR-2000-B NTSC-PAL-SECAM
1 VR-2000-B 405 BRITISH
RCA VTRS
1 RCA TR-600A Type III NTSC
1 RCA TR-70B NTSC
1 RCA TR-60 NTSC
2 INCH QUAD CART MACHINES
1 RCA TCR-100A/SP-100A CART
1 ACR-25-B NTSC-PAL-SECAM CART
Reel SIZE VS. PRICE
This is a 5 minute size plastic spot reel.
Transfer price is $20.00
This is a 10 minute size plastic spot reel.
Transfer price is $30.00
This is a 15 minute size quad reel.
Transfer price is $48.00
This is a 30 minute size quad reel.
Transfer price is $95.00
This is a 60 minute size quad reel.
Transfer price is $125.00
This is a 90 minute size quad reel.
Transfer price is $150.00
Show More
About larry and the quad tape transfer
HOW I GOT HERE
IN-HOUSE VIDEO HEAD REBUILDING
IN-HOUSE VIDEO HEAD REBUILDING
I have always been interested in radio-tv-electronics from an early age. Being a somewhat sickly skinny kid I wasn't very outdoorsy or sports oriented, and so I spent hours and hours indoors reading books and experimenting in my dad's basement. From then 'til now I've spent a lifetime learning this business from the bottom-up and top-dow
I have always been interested in radio-tv-electronics from an early age. Being a somewhat sickly skinny kid I wasn't very outdoorsy or sports oriented, and so I spent hours and hours indoors reading books and experimenting in my dad's basement. From then 'til now I've spent a lifetime learning this business from the bottom-up and top-down in every way imaginable. It officially started for real at age 16 in the 1970's when I went to work part-time in a tv repair shop after school. Being paid based on what I successfully repaired put some pressure on my young brain to produce. If I didn't fix anything, I didn't get paid anything.
After high school I attended Tri Cities State Technical Institute Electronics Engineering Degree program from 1981-1983 for my formal education in electronics.
My first fulltime broadcast television job came in mid 1983 at WJHL-TV as a master control tape operator and air switcher. This was hands-on, on-the-job, sink-or-swim training operating various Ampex and RCA 2 inch quad machines for the first time. I spent a few years in this operator job and in 1987 was promoted to a position in the maintenance shop as a studio electronics repair tech.
In 1997 I moved on to a more advanced job at WEMT-TV as assistant engineer sharing duties with the station Chief Engineer of both studio and transmitter equipment maintenance.
In 2003 I decided to quit the dying analog TV broadcasting engineer profession and go out on my own. In 2004 I started building up a quad tape digitizing business at home.
Being an engineer at heart rather than a business person, I made it my main goal on day one to figure out what it would take to provide a lower cost affordable quad tape transfer service and keep it running.
Being located in Upper East Tennessee has the advantage of being among the lowest cost of living nationwide, compared to the highest cost of living of say perhaps the West Coast or New York City. Or many other big cities for that matter.
The point being: a 2 inch quad VTR operates exactly the same in East Tennessee as it does in Hollywood or New York City, it just doesn't cost as much to operate it here as it does there.
After a few years I had a sea-change in the way I was approaching the transfer work.
I had started out as many others have done in the past, trying to do many different formats of tape besides quad.
One day it dawned on me that instead of trying to do a number of various formats, (and there is a lot of them!), to instead focus on the one thing that I do better than anything else, 2 inch quad, and let some of the other formats go by the wayside.
That opened up a door with two very big advantages.
1: It allowed me to focus on one main type of work and become more efficient.
2: It enabled me to have an opportunity to work with all the other tape transfer businesses that do not have 2 inch quad capability.
When taken into account there are only a handful of fulltime quad businesses(not counting amateurs, hobbyists, or closed shop operations) in the USA. And guessing there is maybe 5,000 tape transfer businesses that are not 2 inch quad capable, but receive inquirys for quad transfers.
It quickly became apparent to me that the course correction I should make is to stop trying to compete with all the other non-quad folks by my dropping many of the tape formats they are doing and need for their survival, and instead do the format they don't have, and work with them, instead of competing against them. And what a difference that has made!
Giving Back
Over the past few years I began to realize that the on-the-job quad vtr training I and other TV ops were given back in the heyday simply does not exist on planet Earth anymore as it once did.
In addition to the ongoing tape transfer work which is my singular main focus, I also open my shop on a limited basis to qualified archivists for quad vtr training, Q & A, and instruction.
At first it started as a reply I made jokingly to someone asking to come visit me. I was very busy with quad tape transfer work at the time and I half-jokingly replied, "Sure, come on over and I will put you to work"...Which is exactly what happened! I had no idea or had not given any real thought that anyone wanted to learn this stuff.
But as it turns out there are a few archivists and electronics techs that were born too late and missed out on the quad vtr days of the past, but still want to have that experience.
For those like-minded younger folks, I do it as a favor and a service, free of charge, so they can come and get hands-on experience as deep as they want to go into the quad guts and live out their dreams of operating and maintaining quad equipment.
And to get an idea of what 2 inch quad videotape preservation work is really about, the small details, things that aren't written in any books or white papers, things that come only thru work and direct personal experience.
Pay It Forward.
IN-HOUSE VIDEO HEAD REBUILDING
IN-HOUSE VIDEO HEAD REBUILDING
IN-HOUSE VIDEO HEAD REBUILDING
In May of 2009 someone forwarded to me a number of articles that various individuals had written anticipating the "end of quad" or "death of quad" as it was often referred to at that time.
Coming from a State Tech EE degree design engineering background, it didn't make much sense to me. After reading thru it for a second time, it made ev
In May of 2009 someone forwarded to me a number of articles that various individuals had written anticipating the "end of quad" or "death of quad" as it was often referred to at that time.
Coming from a State Tech EE degree design engineering background, it didn't make much sense to me. After reading thru it for a second time, it made even less sense to me. But it did stir up my curiosity enough to look further into it. Being a single-minded independent nonconformist, I am very much opposed to relying on someone else's opinions or following a group think-along. I have to prove things to myself and go in my own direction.
I began studying the subject and a few years later in 2014 took a deep dive into it with Professor Mongi Abidi of UT and one of the long-time principal Ampex engineers, Bev Gooch, whom lived nearby after moving back home to Tennessee after his 42 years at Ampex in Redwood City.
Learning from Bev's vast experience in head design (and his chicken soup lunches) gave me a good foundation and understanding and brought order to my thought processes. Now equipped with some new knowledge and background and learning more as I went along, I began searching the world.
This took a few more years to find the right people and for all the the pieces to fall into place.
George Schaller and Amit Patel at National Magnetics supplied the MnZn hot pressed ferrite and Bob Mellors at ICT in Shepperton, UK, fabricated the bonded blocks to the specifications
Bev and I set.
Henry Barnett, a retired tool & die maker from Martin Aircraft and ITT North was helpful with the machining of parts in making the various alignment fixtures and clamping jigs.
Don Hart, a retired manager from Kennametals was helpful in my understanding the principles of sintering and Hot Isostatic Pressing processes.
Zdenek Houska in Prague, CZ., supplied his brain power to assembly balancing and his steady hands and keen eyes at coil winding. I cannot say enough good things about Zdenek's ability. If the term Genius ever applied, he certainly is one, in my book.
David Dean at Westpoint Television in the UK, supplied lapping materials and beta testing and served as liaison to ICT.
Shai Drori at Timeless Recording in Israel got things set into motion by sending a rather large PAL quad tape transfer job my way that generated the money to pay for the head tip production costs. Chris Booth at VT Oldboys in the UK for introducing me to Clive McCarthy(BBC retired)who helped me to convert a quad vtr from NTSC to PAL in order to have the ability to work on Shai's quad job.
And a very special recognition to a dear friend in Melbourne Australia, James Paterson of the Australian Television Archive for all his help in understanding the PAL television standard. The quad heads adventure all really began with James, on our many late-nite tech discussions half a world away.
So now, present-day and beyond, I have the ways and the means to rebuild my own video heads for a fraction of the cost of sending heads out for refurbishing.
Adding this capability has enabled me to run indefinitely and economically into the future years without ever having to raise transfer prices on the customers or worry about video head availability.
And that is how you solve a video head supply problem!
PARTS AND VTRS IN STOCK
IN-HOUSE VIDEO HEAD REBUILDING
PARTS AND VTRS IN STOCK
I've been well blessed with folks coming my way for whatever reason to give me or sell me or trade me quad parts. I am at a loss to explain or understand why, but I'm certainly very thankful for all the generosity and favour. For that, I have become very well stocked in the parts department.
This abundance of spare parts has enabled m
I've been well blessed with folks coming my way for whatever reason to give me or sell me or trade me quad parts. I am at a loss to explain or understand why, but I'm certainly very thankful for all the generosity and favour. For that, I have become very well stocked in the parts department.
This abundance of spare parts has enabled me to tackle most any long-term quad transfer job of hundreds or thousands of tapes and keep things running without downtime 7 days/week year 'round.
Anything on a quad vtr that breaks down here in the shop is repaired by me personally and is back up and running fairly quickly, usually in a day or less.
The abundance of spare quad vtr parts
on the shelf is a major factor in my being able to operate indefinitely and not have to think about increasing any prices for transfer work.
Because: when something breaks down, I don't have to go ask anybody else what to do, or buy a part from a sales vendor and pay 3 or 4 times what it's worth.
The last official count of heads in 2018 was 209, circuit boards and modules: hundreds, transistors, ICs and miscellaneous mech parts: thousands. New ferrite video head tips: hundreds.
I think the actual number of heads has increased upwards to around 350, at the time of this writing in 2021.
Besides the many thousands of component parts and assemblies, many makes and models of RCA and Ampex 2 inch quad VTRs and IVC-9000 2 inch helical VTRs in various states of disassembly are in the spare parts inventory here and held in reserve.
As someone once said long ago,
" the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated".
Don't worry,
Quad is not dead here...Far from it.
Very Far From It.