[QuadList] Rebuilding RCA TR-600s

[Dennis Degan]

		On Sep 9, 2009, at 8:02 PM, I previously wrote:

> 	Rob, you must have known John Tierney then.

		On Sep 9, 2009, at 7:25 PM, Rob Lingelbach wrote:

 > Yes indeed.  I was there 1976-1983 at 510 w. 57th and also down the  
alley at Studio 2 between MPCS and CBS.   It was kind of a college of  
Film and TV production and post-production for me; John T. was one of a  
few leading figures.  Others were Art Dome, Ted Dunn, Thom Forbes,  
Frank Herold, Al Geisler, Ron Ranieri, Paul Dougherty.

		I now say:

	I knew of Al, Ron and Art but I don't think I met them or knew them  
very well.  The others I did not know except for Paul.  I've known Paul  
for about 29 years now.  We both worked at Reeves/Teletape in the early  
'80's, about the time you worked at Unitel.  He called me one night  
asking if I'd like to be in a "Chic" music video he was going to be  
directing.  I was the only one from Reeves that showed up.  I appear in  
the video as a messenger dispatcher, handing a very important envelope  
to a slacker messenger, then shaking my head in disgust as he takes it.  
  That was my only on-camera appearance.
	At Unitel, I edited in the "new" building mostly.  But there was one  
edit room left in 510 that we worked in occasionally, Edit Room 4, in  
the basement.  For a long time, that room belonged mostly to Tierney  
where he cut a lot of Sesame Street segments as well as the Crazy Eddie  
spots.  The room was connected to 515 with fiber optic tie lines that  
ran under 57th Street.

		I previously said:

> 	I worked at Unitel for 12 years, starting in 1987.

		Rob said:

 > aha.  Then there would be many others whom we both know.   Funny  
thing was, I spent 7 years at Editel L.A. starting in 1990, and then  
Unitel bought Editel, so then I was working for the same guys again  
(Barry, Al, Herb).

		I agree:

	Same thing sorta happened to me in New York.  One of the people that  
worked at Editel, NY was an old friend from NBC.  After the sale, he  
came over to 515 to work with us.  Tim Dwight.

		I previously reported:

>  Some of those TR-600's ended their life as dubbing machines in the  
> Unitel dubbing room at the back of 515 West 57th Street, across the  
> street from the original Unitel building.

		Rob continued:

 > ah, right.  Dubbing was my penance for wanting to get into editing.   
I spent 8 months in sheer hell on the night shift 10pm to 6am (often  
until 9-10am) running up to 15 2-inch machines with 90 minute reels,  
shipping out 500 or more dubs of inane commercials like Stouffer's  
frozen dinners or....  they really became absurd when you had to watch  
the playback constantly 100 times for signs of trouble, while running  
those 15 record machines, timing your record run between floors so that  
the formatting of the copies would go without a hitch.

		I empathize:

	My rite of passage was similar at Reeves.  I was an engineer until  
1980, maintaining the 2-inch quads at Reeves and at NBC before that.   
To get into operations, I had to dub spots all night long for a couple  
of years.  My shift was 12 Midnight to 8am.  That was the worst 2 years  
of my life.  But I used my time well, practicing with CMX, trying out  
various things on ADO, etc. between dub setups.
	There are pictures of Unitel 515 taken in 1998, just before it was  
closed (unfortunately, I never shot any pictures of 510) at my Flickr  
photo site, if you're interested:
	<http://www.flickr.com/photos/dennisdegan/sets/72157600587806665/? 
page=3>
	Rob, you and I have a lot in common.

			Dennis Degan, Video Editor-Consultant-Knowledge Bank
	  					NBC Today Show, New York