[QuadList] Ampex Models

Tue Mar 1 10:26:48 CST 2011

Hi Cris,

The best Frank Davis story is when he moved to Texas, he brought an old Pick Up truck  back to life as his daily driver, and it may have been his Mothers?
After seeing the gun racks in the cab rear windows, he added one, and then built a wooden replica kit of a Thompson Submachine Gun, and carried it in his rear window.
I  believe he created the joke, when asked how he made it home from a bad night, he would say,
 "I was doing all right, until some damn fool stepped on my Hand!"
Many good Frank Davis stories, Thanks for bringing them back.

Bill Carpenter

--- On Tue, 3/1/11, Chill315 at aol.com <Chill315 at aol.com> wrote:

From: Chill315 at aol.com <Chill315 at aol.com>
Subject: Re: [QuadList] Ampex Models
To: quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com
Date: Tuesday, March 1, 2011, 5:14 AM

Bill

That was a great session at the SMPTE meeting.  Yes I do remember Hugo 
Bundy.  A little bit of a southern character.  The state of ENG at 
that time was so primitive.  The equipment was not designed to do what we 
were doing.  It was amazing that there were not more issues.  The cost 
benefits were so great that we had to proceed down that path.  

Frank was a great field engineer.  I still remember how we spent a 
long night trying to resolve why the RA-4000 would not do match frame edits with 
the AVR-2's that we had.  About 3 in the morning we proved that it was the 
boost was still on when the RA-4000 sensed lock and released tape speed over 
ride.  Then the boost would cause the machine to slip a frame.  The 
RA-4000 only needed one frame of time code match to say sync was achieved.  
I had been going down that road and he was going down the road that the problem 
was in the AVR-2.  That was because we also had VR-1200's on the 
RA-4000.  The AVR-2 with the DC capstan was so good at lock up.

Anyway Frank gave me a great saying over this.  "Some times you need 
someone to come along grab your ears and pull your head out of your rear so 
you can see the problem from the right way."

He came up with a fix that worked better than the factory came up with 
later when they issued a field bulletin.

Lastly, the ACR-25 was such a great machine.  It never broke unless 
the smell of burnt plastic was from the melting of the drive hub that mated from 
the spools in the cassette acted up.  

I saw the RCA machine at other stations and how much they had to do to keep 
it going.  You guys did it right.

Chris Hill

In a message dated 2/28/2011 9:50:33 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, 
wcarpen107 at yahoo.com writes:

      Hi Cris and everybody!

Yes, That was a great 
        meeting, and my paper was sort of an alternative answer to the ENG 
        question. The handwriting was on the wall related to Eng, when we came 
        back to the Hotel later on Friday night after driving in the heavy snow 
        and found that the "crackbarrel" session in a small room on the lower 
        level was attended by maybe 200 engineers mostly out in the halllway, 
        not the 25-30 that normally go to those unplanned & unstructured 
        sessions.

The next day, a good old southern boy from Atlanta, 
        Hugo Bundy (if my 35+ years memory is right) got up and tore apart every 
        piece equipment that he had used! 
Then he put up a slide of his 
        ACR-25, and stated that without this machine the whole ENG effort would 
        have been unuseable!
He said they would roll the 3/4" field tapes 
        many times and record each time until they got the one that  worked 
        and then use the ACR to clip the ends, and also that this would allow 
        last second changes in the news playback on an "as required" basis with 
        NO PROBLEMS. 
The ACR was his last slide and was on-sceen for over 
        half on his paper and all of the Q & A.
I was sitting next to Don 
        Kleffman, our Marketing Manager, and two levels above me, when leaned 
        over and asked me if I had anything to do with this presentation?
I 
        answered NO, but I was sure going to buy the man a drink or more before 
        the weekend was over! Don was pleased with my answer!

Bill 
        Carpenter

PS: Frank Davis was always a great field engineer and a 
        good friend, both at Belo, and previously at Northwest 
        Teleproductions.

--- On Mon, 2/28/11, Chill315 at aol.com 
        <Chill315 at aol.com> wrote:

From: 
          Chill315 at aol.com <Chill315 at aol.com>
Subject: [QuadList] Ampex 
          Models
To: quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com
Date: Monday, 
          February 28, 2011, 4:35 PM

          I was not sure of the actual count and I thought there might be 
          21.  The question was answered with all sorts of speed.  

          The ones that I thought might be difficult were the E models 
          of the 1100 and the 1200.  Also the VR-3000B.

          I did see the VR-3000B demonstrated at the Detroit SMPTE meeting 
          as an alternative to 3/4 tape.  It worked beautifully.  The 
          operating cost must have been against it.  Frank Davis was at the 
          meeting and manned the booth.  He later became a VP at 
          Belo.  

          I know of another VR-1200 that had the detachable monitor 
          rack.  This was sold to the University of Michigan Television 
          Center.  It was used in the studio and in a remote truck that 
          only did a few shows in black and white.  There was a monitor 
          setup in the truck.

          Now were there any VR-1001B models?  The reason that I 
          ask is that the Intersync book tells about how to install the 
          Intersync in the VR-1001A.  Was it standard in the B model?  
          So who can answer this question?

          Chris Hill
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