brent@itm.UUCP (Brent) (04/03/84)
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Cassettes - Part 3
Whether you record material on the tape before you put it into
the cassette shell or after, the question remains: how do you get
300 feet of tape into the little plastic shell gracefully?
Originally (and still for some applications) what they did was
this: you put a little hub onto a motor shaft, wind onto it however
much tape you want, cut the tape, stake the end onto another hub, place
the hubs on half a shell, and assemble the shell. Cassettes cost a
lot in those days.
Along came a machinist named King. He realized this method was
stupid. He got a shell manufacturer to make the shell already assembled,
with 18 inches of leader in it, staked to the two hubs. He then made a
machine which would cut and splice the leader to the tape, wind a given
amount in, cut the tape, and make the final splice. Since Mr. King was
a machinist, the original machine was all pneumatic. No electricity.
The tape tension was maintained by dancer arms, and the winding shafts
were driven by air turbines, not motors. A truely fearsome machine.
This was in the dark ages: about 15 years ago. He started King
Instrument Company, just outside Boston. The old man retired about
three years ago. Yes, they've long since hired electrical engineers
and they use servos and motors now. Now King winders are the
standard of the industry, well almost. Next time I'll tell how two
guys named Dave did for King winders what Berkeley did for Version 6.
--
Brent Laminack (akgua!itm!brent)