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"New" 8-track players being made?

OldSkool, I had almost the same setup Supertuner/booster/Jensen triaxials. The speakers were in the rear hatch of my 1979 VW Scirocco and made the most perfect outdoor party boombox ever. The police were called several times for that combo!!
 
Celt said:
Close, Fidelipacks and Insta-Carts ran @ 7.5 ips, had no internal puck and were made better than 8 Track carts. Special lubricated tape stock from 3m or BASF was used and the carts were either full track mono or 1/2 track stereo. This along with the faster running speed offered superior fidelity over the 8 track. These carts had a hole in the bottom front where the recorder or playback deck would raise a rubber puck that engaged with the capstan. These rubber wheels were on bronze hubs with bearing packs. Compare that to the 8-track with a plastic or rubber puck on a plastic post that was part of the cartridge. There were different grades of radio station carts, but they were far more reliable than 8 tracks...they had to be. Oh, cueing was done by encoding a rumble tone at the beginning of the tape, where the splice was. Recording over the splice was never done.
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Celt, you hit close to home. The carts as you describe are actually closer to the old 4-track tapes. They too allowed the player to raise a rubber capstan into the hole which in theory would give you better drive action. The fact that the 4-track had this drive system and only 4 channels of audio on the tape would make them technically superior to the 8-track.

But as in other cases, the superior design did not prevail! :no:

Do you know the sigificance of my avatar to this topic?
 
70salesguy said:
Celt, you hit close to home. The carts as you describe are actually closer to the old 4-track tapes. They too allowed the player to raise a rubber capstan into the hole which in theory would give you better drive action. The fact that the 4-track had this drive system and only 4 channels of audio on the tape would make them technically superior to the 8-track.

But as in other cases, the superior design did not prevail! :no:

Do you know the sigificance of my avatar to this topic?
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Yep. Madman Muntz designed the 4 track tape cartridge. That IS what the radio station carts were based on. A superior tape cart!
 
I didn't want to provide TMI, but while I was in college and selling stereo gear,
I also worked at 2 different radio stations! The stereo store was closed on Sundays, so I had a 2nd job (while full-time engineering student).

I was familiar with the carts because all the commercials and PSA's were on them. Also, we would record the news and weather on carts (just a few minutes ahead) so as to lessen the chance of an on-air flub.

I remember seeing and hearing 4-track units in some cars. You would insert the cart and push the lever to engage the capstan. I remember 4-track going out and 8-track coming in.

I bet an original Muntz 4-track player is pretty rare!
 
OldSkool said:
My friend you just dated yourself for sure. haha

I well remember the coveted Pioneer KP-500 hooked to the Jensen 6x9 Triax. I had a Sparkomatic powerbooster & EQ on my setup. :D
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This is REALLY gong to sound kitschy! My friend that had the Pioneer, the power booster and the Jensen TriAxials had it in his 75 Transam. I helped with the install and after a temporary install where we would listen to the unit with the power booster on and then off and savor the difference, we discussed where to mount the booster amp so he could get to the boost/normal switch.
I said why not just hide the thing under the console (plenty of room) and leave the boost switch "on". Why have the booster amp and not use it? He agreed and we then performed the "stealth" installation. :thmbsp:

It was the best sounding car stereo we had ever heard. We used to ride around listening to the Fleetwood Mac album "Rumors". Now to be fair, my friend was not the stereotypical "Saturday Night Live" skit portrayed redneck.
I was an I&C specialist in a Nuclear Power Plant and he was a Field Startup Engineer for GE!

Here's the sad part. Even though I made decent $$$, I COULDN'T afford this setup for my own car! :tears:

Leave you with this one ; A friend called me about a month ago and said "I finally bought something I've been wanting for 30 years. I asked him what it was. He said "a 1976 Oldsmobile Cutlass" Said he could finally pay cash for one!
 
On the plus side, 8-tracks ran at 3-3/4 ips.
On the minus side (besides the physical limitations already mentioned), there are 8 audio tracks squeezed onto 1/4" wide tape.

s/n and frequency response (particularly the former) were fundamentally limited.

One other thought on the early 4- and 8-track comsumer cartridge formats. One of the earliest (8-track) players was the "LearJet" car stereo, from Bill "Lear Jet" Lear.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Lear
 
Many 8-track tapes had "Lear" embossed on the housings. He took Madman Muntz's idea and changed it to 8 tracks rather than 4, installed the pinch roller IN the housing and eventually took over the market. They actually competed for a while, but the 8 track won, muh like Beta and VHS competed.
 
And for those who have never seen a 4-track cartridge,here's a couple.I can't find my "widget",the pinch roller gadget you snapped into the cartridge before you inserted into the player,it goes into the whole visible on the cart on the left.The only players I've ever seen for these tapes were car stereo's...did they make home players for these things? Rob
 
retrokeeper said:
And for those who have never seen a 4-track cartridge,here's a couple.I can't find my "widget",the pinch roller gadget you snapped into the cartridge before you inserted into the player,it goes into the whole visible on the cart on the left.The only players I've ever seen for these tapes were car stereo's...did they make home players for these things? Rob
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All of the 4-track players that I've ever seen, the capstan and pinch roller were built into the player. You inserted the cartridge and THEN slid a lever or knob towards the back of the player which engaged the pinch roller and capstan.

Were they any models that required this "adapter" thing to play, or could this have been an adapter designed to allow one to play 4-track tapes in an 8-track player? I don't know. :scratch2:






















' thi
 
DENNYDOG said:
Not the worst specs in the world. One thing I have noticed with 8-tracks though is most of them sound way better (if the tape doesn't break the first couple times you play them) than comparable cassette tapes from the same era, even the ones originally recorded in dolby. I have way more 8-tracks that actually sound VERY good considering the technology compared to maybe a couple of cassette tapes. Even the aftermarket tapes I recorded back then don't compare to the 8-tracks I've listened to.

Any thoughts on this?
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8-track tape moves past the head at twice the speed of cassette tape. That tends to amke it easier to bring out the brightness... same reason VHS videotapes have better picture quality on SP speed than EP speed.
 
Of the best blanks tapes you could buy for the 8-track to record on,TDK,Maxell,&Sony made the best.If you find any today,still in the shrinkwraping,you'll still need to replace the foam pressure pad. Rob
 
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