[QuadList] AVR1

[Peter Ford]

New Zealand had 6 AVR1s - They were originally acquired for the 1974 
Commonwealth Games in Christchurch.  After the games they were relocated - A 
pair in the Auckland Studios, a pair at Avalon Wellington, One in the 
Christchurch studios and one in the Dunedin Studios.

When Television New Zealand "retired" them in the late 1990's The New 
Zealand Film Archive was donated one from Avalon on the condition they carry 
out the relocation themselves.  Unfortunately being "film people" and 
un-accustomed to shifting machines weighing a ton the Film Archive staff 
managed to drop the AVR1 off the back of a truck.  As a contractor to the 
Film Archive I rescued this machine and dismantled it completely to use as a 
source of spare parts should another machine be acquired.

Later the Film Archive managed to acquire the second AVR1 from Avalon, then 
even later one of the AVR1s from the South Island.  However the South Island 
machine had been left outside and as it was in a very rusty condition, I did 
not bother to try and restore it.  However I restored, maintained and 
operated the 2nd AVR1 ex Avalon until another incident in 2008.

Just after installing my last remaining working head someone decided to use 
the area where the machine was located as a carpentry shop and filled the 
room with sawdust.  When the machine was next turned on dust was sucked into 
the machine seizing the head air bearings.  This lead to an unresolved 
dispute between myself and Film Archive management and the two complete 
machines and many spare parts have remained untouched ever since.

One machine could probably be restored to working condition again without 
too much effort.  However the Film Archive has no budget and/or the 
technical expertise to do this.  Most unfortunate as I had carefully tweaked 
this machine to be very gentle on handling tape and it worked superbly as a 
restoration machine.

Peter Ford

> From: "John" <john at jmit.com.au>
> Date: August 8, 2013 2:30:41 AM PDT
> To: <quadlist-bounces at quadvideotapegroup.com>
> Subject: AVR 1
>
>
> While on the subject, how many AVR1's were made. We (ABC TV Aust) had one 
> in Sydney and one in Melbourne. we also had 2 ACR25's in Sydney, not sure 
> about Melb.
>
> The AVR1 was good with "difficult" tapes, especially from our VR3000 with 
> its" weird" tracking position. We also used the AVR1 for replay of NTSC 
> tapes through our Quantel standards convertor in the 70's and 80's. 
> Sometimes it even did on airs!. Great for news and current affairs backup 
> with it's spooling capabilities...
>
> John Miller
> Rocky River
> NSW
> Australia