You know you're old when...

[M_Six]

Originally Posted by 3.0L

Mom caught us many times skimming the cream off the top for our cereal.
Man, that was good!

My Mom used to make whipped cream from scratch. Heavy cream, vanilla extract, sugar. Then she'd whip it up with the dual paddle hand mixer. You had to be quick to get one of the paddles to "clean" off.

[vreihen16]

We can still buy milk in glass bottles here, from a small regional dairy. No delivery though, and they collect a $3.00 bottle deposit on each one.....

[Lady Jane]

[wizardofOz]

Originally Posted by Artemis

Back in the 70s my dad used to play tapes with compilations of his favorite 60s music inside the car. Beatles, Elvis, etc. He knew virtually all the English lyrics - we didn't understand the language, had no clue. So we asked what the songs were about and could "la-la-la" most of them. This was one of those songs. If we wanted to hear some song again, he usually flipped over the tape to play a song on the other tape side and subsequently flipped it again to hear the initial song again for a sing-along.

That makes sense, I'm guessing its those black cassette tapes you are talking about back in the 70's. I remember putting a finger through those white holes to retract and tighten the tape and may have destroyed one or two by accident.

Pretty sure one or two boxes are lying around somewhere.

[wizardofOz]

Originally Posted by vreihen16

We can still buy milk in glass bottles here, from a small regional dairy. No delivery though, and they collect a $3.00 bottle deposit on each one.....

I don't think we have any glass bottled milk locally, all we do have is plastic containers now, shame really.

[Artemis]

Originally Posted by wizardofOz

That makes sense, I'm guessing its those black cassette tapes you are talking about back in the 70's. I remember putting a finger through those white holes to retract and tighten the tape and may have destroyed one or two by accident.

Pretty sure one or two boxes are lying around somewhere.

We also had a reel to reel tape recorder.

Not allowed to touch the device when it was spooling fast forward or fast backwards. A matter of keeping all fingers and the tapes intact.

[Llarry]

Originally Posted by Artemis

We also had a reel to reel tape recorder.

Not allowed to touch the device when it was spooling fast forward or fast backwards. A matter of keeping all fingers and the tapes intact.

My much-loved Teac X-700R open-reel tape deck stopped functioning years ago, leaving me without a way to listen to my large collections of tapes. I couldn't find anyone who could fix it. I ended up selling it for a pittance and dumped something like 70 tapes into the landfill.

I started with open-reel audio in 1965 and continued to record for about 20 years. That X-700R had dbx noise reduction. It was probably my 10th open reel recorder.

Now I feel old...

[Lady Jane]

Originally Posted by Llarry

My much-loved Teac X-700R open-reel tape deck

I have my dad's reel deck. According to my mother, he purchased it in 1976, made one tape then it went in long term storage with their F & E as they were transferred overseas. When they rotated back to Canada, he was into CDs and the deck never saw the light of day again. I also still have the tape he made but I figured it's probably unplayable. It makes a nice conversation piece. And speaking of DBX, I also have three units in boxes. A DBX3BX, a sub-harmonic synthetizer and a DBX router.

[Llarry]

Originally Posted by Lady Jane

I have my dad's reel deck. According to my mother, he purchased it in 1976, made one tape then it went in long term storage with their F & E as they were transferred overseas. When they rotated back to Canada, he was into CDs and the deck never saw the light of day again. I also still have the tape he made but I figured it's probably unplayable. It makes a nice conversation piece. And speaking of DBX, I also have three units in boxes. A DBX3BX, a sub-harmonic synthetizer and a DBX router.

I went through open reel tape decks like water; let me recap:
1965 - Sony tape recorder with speakers
1966 - Akai tape recorder with speakers
1971 - Teac tape deck (top-of-the-line A7010 with 10.5" reels)
1973 - Sansui tape deck (quadrophonic QD5500S)
1974 - Another Sansui QD5500S deck
1975 - Pioneer RT-1020 (10.5" reel-capable) tape deck
1977 - Teac A-4300SX tape deck
1981 - Teac X-7R tape deck
1989 - Teac X-700R tape deck

Speaking as a layman, I thought the highest quality tape decks in the 1970s were the Sansui units: They were rock-solid. Although I bought 4-channel units, I don't think I ever used them in 4-channel mode. But I think Sansui did not play in the open-reel arena for long.

What made this all possible was the insanely low prices I could buy audio equipment for in the military exchanges -- basically half of the U.S. list price. I would buy a piece of audio gear (tape deck or turntable or receiver), use it for a year or two and then resell it for about what I had paid. I suspect your Dad and other Canadian forces members had a similar good deal going on during their European tours of duty.

[3.0L]

Originally Posted by Llarry

My much-loved Teac X-700R open-reel tape deck stopped functioning years ago, leaving me without a way to listen to my large collections of tapes. I couldn't find anyone who could fix it. I ended up selling it for a pittance and dumped something like 70 tapes into the landfill.

I started with open-reel audio in 1965 and continued to record for about 20 years. That X-700R had dbx noise reduction. It was probably my 10th open reel recorder.

Now I feel old...

This worries me. Those reel-to-reel player/recorders are not that difficult to repair. Its not rocket science. As I’ve whined about it in the past, the brainy students I was around at our local university didn’t know one end of a screwdriver from another. Or if a rare few did, they’d get a blister in the palm of their hand using it.

[Artemis]

Originally Posted by Llarry

My much-loved Teac X-700R open-reel tape deck stopped functioning years ago, leaving me without a way to listen to my large collections of tapes. I couldn't find anyone who could fix it. I ended up selling it for a pittance and dumped something like 70 tapes into the landfill.

I started with open-reel audio in 1965 and continued to record for about 20 years. That X-700R had dbx noise reduction. It was probably my 10th open reel recorder.

Now I feel old...

I should check but think that it was an Akai device. Analog/physical counter (no digital numbers). It featured a black leather or leatherette protection cover which was always fitted when not in use.

[JJ 911SC]

We use to have one of those in the EW Shack to record Ruski transmissions.