G'day Bill,



10 Mar 97 06:41, Bill Grimsley wrote to Rod Gasson:



 RG>> I picked up some cheap videotapes the other day for general

 RG>> workshop use and have discovered a major flaw with them that

 RG>> could cause a few headaches.



 BG> It wouldn't be the first time that cheap tapes have caused

 BG> problems...



This is true.   'course, I've also had problems with expensive tapes

too.



 RG>> The tapes are "Stereo Club  XG1 E-180 HQ" .. "Japanese

 RG>> technology. carefully Made in India"   Did I mention they

 RG>> were only $2.00 each?



 BG> Do they carry the official VHS logo?  Some cheapies don't, because



These ones do.



 BG> its use incurs a royalty fee which is directly payable to JVC.  If I

 BG> find any sans logo, they go straight into the bin here.



I dunno if you snipped it, or whether I never said, but these tapes

are made under licence by the Victor Company of Japan (JVC)



 RG>> Anyway, I'd just finished fixing a VCR and thought I'd put

 RG>> one of these new tapes in and leave it running for a while.

 RG>> All was fine until the tape got to the end, and it didn't

 RG>> wanna rewind :-( My first thought was the machine had a

 RG>> problem, until I tried another tape and it rewound that just

 RG>> fine..



 BG> Which eliminates the possibility that it didn't have a clear leader

 BG> at both ends (and yes, I have actually struck that one before).



  Yeah...   the entire tape was 'leader' instead 



 RG>> Anyway, be warned - if you get an influx of VCR's in for no

 RG>> rewind, intermittent rewind, or stopping on play.. then check

 RG>> the tapes.. or at least be aware of the problem..  The tapes

 RG>> are easy to identify.. just shine a torch through the tape

 RG>> itself... it's amazing!  I keep going back to recheck them,

 RG>> 'cos I hardly believe such a blunder.



 BG> Videotape itself is clear, before the bonding agent and ferrite

 BG> powder is added, so perhaps they skimped on ferrite dust.  If they



That was my first thought - it could still be true - but the pictures

recorded on it were perfectly clear - I'd have expected a lot of

dropouts if the ferrite had been skimped on to such an extent that the

tape is semi-transparent.



 BG> can retail them for around $2 each, they've definitely cut corners

 BG> somewhere...



I'm guessing that it is possibly the bonding at fault - assuming the

bonding is normally a brownish colour, like the ferrite itself, and in

this instance they decided to use a clear bonding. Tis just a guess

though.



Cheers,

Rod



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