8mm Cleaning Tape for Video8 / Hi8 / Digital8 Devices

Description

The 8mm cleaning tape is designed to pick-up dirt via adhesion from the very first use. In the process of contact cleaning with the helical  mechanism, more surface area of the rug / ribbon touches the head drum unlike a liner audio tape which only makes a very small contact with stationary head while surface friction is compounded by the stickiness of the dirt, grease, oil or sugar base contaminants that may require as much as 20x more effort from a good working mechanism compared to a silky smooth ribbon of a standard recordable media tape.
This therefore may reveal mechanical issues with your aging devices you maybe not aware of a cleaning tape cannot correct such as:
#1. If the reels do not move – it’s an indication of worn/hardened rubber pinch roller has very little traction.
#2. Ejected and comes out not properly retracted or eaten by your faulty device – it’s a indication of worn/weak take-up reel clutch.
#3. It wont play or move but regular tape does - weak over all traction of both reel and pinch rollers.
If you experience any issues like mentioned, please do not suspect the cleaning tape and instigate a return for refund.
This NEW and SEALED cleaning tape it is not returnable nor can be sold again once opened. Its cleaning ribbon can only be used but one pass or it will recontaminate the mechanism tape path if you do and spread the contamination with the succeeding media tapes you load into the device & ruin them. DO NOT REWIND or FAST FORWARD a cleaning tape - it will destroy it to the point it will no longer work. Simply discard once it reaches the end.
ISSUES YOU NEED TO BE AWARE OF ABOUT Media Tapes (before you purchase):
Media Tape issues are more prevalent now a days than not. We are well aware being in the service business for over 35 years and these get worse thru the years, so part of our service process is to maintain good sets of quality controlled media tapes in testing phase to ensure every device is perfect before it gets shipped out.
The following are the top most significant factors affecting Media Tapes deterioration:
1)
Age of Media Tapes – magnetic particles erosion starting from ribbon edges are the first to go (much like the end to end tip of a shoe lace). On Beta/VHS Linear audio & tracking residing in these area are affected from weaken to complete loss resulting to video mute or blue/black TV screen.
2)
Wear and stretching of tape ribbons – every playback wears and stretches the media tapes as it passes thru the video heads with some degree of friction (tapes are suppose to travel thru these path in silky smooth fashion and keep friction at the minimum but this may not be the case on non-maintained devices). These gets worse until the device reel tension is adjusted & tape path cleaned thru proper maintenance. Unfortunately most independent servicers dont do this due to lack of proper tools.
3)
Recording devices as they age also develops issues in #1) electronics, #2) wearing mechanism which translates into overall poor recordings. For example - a mechanical wear skew the overall angle of recording stripes along the tape ribbon. It is common that the recordings made will playback with no to little issue with the same recording device since recording stripes matches but most likely way off already from industry standard tolerance. This type of wear tolerance has been accounted for from the very beginning in the design of the technology with the inclusion of manual tracking control so can be adjusted at some degree of tolerance to compensate for variance of different recording devices and if beyond correction is a clear indication the device must be serviced and adjusted.
4)
Contaminations - resulting into snowy to no video & mech jam (Dust, loose magnetite particles from erosion, grease, soda splash & worse mold). We professionally clean every devices internally. However, nothing can stop it from getting contaminated again when a bad tape is loaded and made contact to the device’s internals. Contamination is instantaneous. Wet alcohol-base cleaning tape may help all depends on severity (soda/sugar base are very bad news)
It’s our common practice to restore the device to its near - like new condition performance wise the best we can but unfortunately, the typical media issues - we can only explain for your awareness but beyond our capability to solve as professional servicer. They are not an integral part of any device we restore, therefore – they are what they are.