17 Dec
2007
17 Dec
'07
6:57 p.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
<snip>
On the local Freecycle, I see VHS recorders hitting the landfill with
incredible regularity. Why not simply scavenge the heads from a few
of these? Certainly, the frequency response should be good enough.
<snip>
Cheers,
Chuck
I think you have an excellent suggestion. Also I'd be tempted to
salvage the head itself and use it as a nice balanced "drum" to start
the project with and coat it with various magnetic concoctions to try
recording on before making the actual drum. You'd have to remount it,
but it would be balanced for spinning at high speed anyway.
I wonder if something as crude as a careful job of gluing (what
adhesive) video tape on the head and spinning that would work for a start?
Assuming that you had a single head and that a single spin of the head
represents 1 video frame, you'd have about 200k bit pulses possible
(don't know any exact amount, but am using something less that 512 x 512
for the density).
Biggest problem would be with getting a head that actually spins as some
units I've seen have only a spinning head, and also whether there is a
way to glue the tape on the head and get it to adhere for testing. Then
you'd have to figure out what to use for the actual drum even if it worked.
Jim