NAGRA IV-BL output cable

[minister]

just recorded a bunch of gun shots on my Nagra IV. i know PSC makes cables, and location sound, and probably others sell them... but can someone tell me what kind of connector is uses? some kinda banana? this is the IV-BL, which is mono (2 pre's though). if some kind of banana could tell me, i'd appreciate it. i can make my own damn cable. thanks!

[Craig F]

standard banana ends work just fine (from Radio Shack will work)

looking at the right side of the Nagra:

the 2 jacks to the front edge of the unit are the signal out, the 2 jacks to the rear edge are ground points

I am going to assume XLR:

the 2 forward jacks connect to pins 2 and 3

one of the rear jacks connects to pin 1


Yes, you have 2 mic pres but they sum to mono for recording
you also have a line input on banana

[minister]

THANKS CRAIG!

[FlorianE]

It's been a long time..

but exactly for shotguns I wouldn't use the banana plugs output! This is a +14 dB line from a transformer which had notouriously bad bass distortion. You'll get a much better signal from the 'mixer' output at the left side panel (Tuchel 7-pin, if I remember right; pinout is printed on the chassis). There the signal is unbalanced, about 560mV, and clean. (I mean, clean tape saturation for shots).

Cheers

Florian

[minister]

oooo...thanks. i'll get both from the electronics store and try them..good to know!

but WAIT..i have an OTARI MTR-10. it plays the tapes. but is the output different? are the play back heads doing somthing funny to the tape since it is a mono recording???

thanks guys.

[FlorianE]

Nagra tape flux is standard; tapes should play back fine on another machine if it is aligned correctly and you use the right playback equalisation. S/N ratio would be best from a full-width mono head.
Problems can arise if you recorded with 'Pilotone' - was there a metal cap connector on the 4-pin tuchel on the right, next to the O/P bananas? - this would feed the internal 50Hz Xtal gen to the pilotone circuit. Pilotone was recorded on two center tracks in counter-phase. On a mono playback head, reading the whole width of tape, this pilotone would cancel out. Playback on stereo machines could produce a parasite 50Hz at the slightest track mismatch. But at least, it is clean enough to be notched out.

Cheers
Florian

[sco]

FlorianE, where on the chasis is the pin-out for the mixer-out? Or do you know of a web site that would have such info? Funnily enough, I have been mucking around with mine lately and thought that there had to be another line out other than the banana plug outs...
thanks

[FlorianE]

It's pin 5 (playback amp O/P, 560mv at 0dB into 100kOhms) and pin 7 Ground (positive ground with Nagras!!)

Check here:
Nagra 4.2 Manual pdf

Cheers
Florian

[Richard Fairbanks]

Just for the sake of thoroughness....
You will get a slight bass boost when you play that full track mono tape on a 1/2 track head. No big deal, somewhere around 2-3db depending on frequency. It is caused by the width of the full track (mono sound across the entire 1/4" tape track) when played across a 1/2 track tape head. Some extra low frequency energy is induced by the tape particles passing nearby the tape head's gap, above and below the actual accepted magnetic track. The extra energy from those particles become significant at lower frequencies only, steadily rising below about 700hz, up to (if I recall, Rich B can answer this) 4 or 6 db at 20hz. You would get even more bass boost if you play that tape on a 1/4 track head.
Signal to noise is also affected, 3db more hiss for 1/2 track vs. full track.

Who said I was asleep during my internship?

[tomcat]

wow. such delicious old-schools analog talk. makes me long my old 4.2 which I should have kept!