Byer motel

[rick]

at some point in the past i offered up a prize for anybody delivering a photo of themselves standing outside the BYER motel which is hidden somewhere between sydney and melbourne .

i was going to give away an australian classic microphone - a torpedo ribbon to the keen traveller

well i now draw the contest to a close and renig on any promise of microphone
two reasons
1. its been long enough i reckon
2. i plugged the mic in yesterday did ten minutes worth of repairs and retuned the ribbon
and frankly... wow ... i am keeping it

[The Tasmanian]

Hey Rick - I have driven past the motel about 6 times since that offer - but always on my own (with the dog - who cannot take photo's)
And always forgot to have a AT Mag with me - but every time i went past I thought about that mic.....
What was the mic by the way - was it a Zepher?

[toddd]

man!!

i've driven past there 6 or so times too, and thought about turtlerock everytime. i didn't even realise there was a prize on offer still..

oh regrets, i've had a few..ha.

[waitup]

man!!

i've driven past there 6 or so times too, and thought about turtlerock everytime. i didn't even realise there was a prize on offer still..

oh regrets, i've had a few..ha.

Tell my brothers band they have to write a song about it!

[rick]

yeah zepher torpedo ribbon
it sounds great (thanks to a few ribbon tuning tips by mr dooley )
oh well i WAS being generous ... now i am just being mean

[tunetown]

I think Tim S still has the Byer66 he won in your first competition about that hotel. Even though Google Earth was involved. It's not been refurbished yet.

Glad it sounds good.

Hopefully, you'll still have some more competitions in the future that have a winner. There's too much great old stuff in your shed not to share around.

[Chris H]

this is all i need to give me a little push to get my zepher going properly. At the moment it has a " home made ribbon" ie alfoil beaten to make it thinner. It also hums like there is an earthing problem. Should pair very nicely with the Byer preamp.

Zepher#1.jpg

Zepher#2.jpg

[rick]

thats the mic chris

there are a bunch of guys on ebay selling sheets of really thin ribbon material
do yourself the favour and pay the outragous price for a small sheet
($20) and stop messing around trying to reinvent the wheel me thinks
it should not hum .. but you know that huh ?

the original ribbon folds are a fair bit steeper then i expected ie closer and steeper then an RCA , but i tightened it up and it when from
" yeah is ok its a ribbon but its no RCA 44 "
to
"wow this sounds really good .. not giving this away better get on the net and close that competition down "

[Chris H]

BUM

[rick]

as for pairing it with the byer pre ..
having spoken to wes dooley for three days and nights at integrate i am rethinking my approach to ribbons
i used to hate them all except the RCA 44 , a bruno and a reslo ribbon i have, i dont want to have to eq every track i record because its dull
and although ribbons "take eq " really well i just couldnt see the point
so i havent been in the ribbon revival bus

Wes (AEA) makes the ribbon pre i am sure you have all heard about , but the thing is the mic input impedance is something like 12k ohms (constant in relation to freq )
where most pres max out at 1200 ohms or 2k if its newer and have a moving target compared to freq / impedance relation ship

what all that means is his mic pre makes ribbons sound better then they EVER did , less need for eq and his mic pre has massive amounts of super quiet gain to play with , which is something no neve or no tube pre i own and like can give .

all up those AEA pres are too cheap to ignore , i was ignoring them because they "look as cheap on the outside " as they are .
but inside they are really well made .. who knew !.
if i ever get out of the hole i have dug myself with the studio move i will be buying 4 pairs of them !
so my boxes of kooky mics can have another go at playing with the big dogs instead of hiding under the porch

[Chris H]

My comment above is best ignored.....my 13 yr old thinks he's clever by trying to embarrass me on turtlerock because he wants the computer.

As for reinventing the wheel, you are bound to be disappointed ..................

square_bike_wheel.jpg

[Ben M]

BUM

First post at 13. And a bewdy!!

[stosostu]

I spent some time with Wes Dooley when he was in Adelaide recently, discussing my home made techniques for making ribbons. After many failed attempts to get decent corrugations, I now actually use two Vegemite lids, the yellow plastic ones with the striated edges. I showed Wes a couple of mine and he was most complimentary (might just be that he didn't want to upset the locals). I was able to get a roll foil from a capacitor manufacturer some years ago, that has the right thickness and composition. I did make some replacement ribbons for a pair of Kelly horns as well, using ordinary aluminium cooking foil, no good for mics as it is way too thick, but it has been working well in the Kelly's for many years. I currently have a Reslo on the bench awaiting a new ribbon, but I have to be in an advanced state of relaxation (not chemically induced) before I do ribbons as it is the most fiddly and frustrating of undertakings. One important thing I learned from Wes, is that you can leave a reasonable gap either side of the ribbon to the magnets, up to a millimetre is not a problem, I spent a lot of time and energy trying to get it down to the thickness of a sheet of paper, which I now know was unnecessary........you get that, though

I use a number of ribbons in my studio, both local and overseas ones. The big Zephyrs (can't remember the model number), The Steanes and the Zephyr R45s are amongst my favourites of the Oz ones. I had some pres made years ago by a guy in Adelaide who has a company called Valve Research, and all my ribbon mics sound great through them.

[rick]

wes and i discussed the vegemite tins over dinner

then we moved on to the best way and only to do it consistantly ..with a geared crimper like the RCA ones ....
err... and he wont sell me one of those !

[Chris H]

What about something like this:

07-03-WP-Gears.gif

[stosostu]

Yep, but for a DIY, even if you could get an RCA crimper, it would be beyond the budget. I have thought a few times about creating a proper unit, like the RCA ones but there's always something easier, and probably more profitable, to do.

[rick]

i totally agree with you bob , thats why i put wes on the spot when i had him cornered after i had been nice to him for a couple of days

after much blushing he said something like
"ok i have been fixing ribbon mics for a living for money for thirty years , i like you Rick i am going to make and exception and i will sell you some of our unique ribbon materials
but as for the crimpers .. well best you make your own arrangements... we had to "

then he told me a few stories about guys with wrigleys chewing gum wrapper foil , and vegemite tins

i keep thinking there must be a set of gears in a remote control hobby shop for a few bucks that would do the job like chris' photo
then i remember the ribbon mics in my life are the lowest things on the studio totem pole
and i find something else to wonder about .

first guy to DIY a gear ribbon crimper that works gets to sell it to me at cost plus 10% !

[rick]

somebody just sent me this picture of a DIY rca ribbon crimper

now if they could just send me that one !

[rick]

and of course here is the real thing

[Chris H]

Any pics of that contraption showing a bit more detail, or to indicate scale or size, and spacing of the gear.....didn't i read in someones sig "the journey never ends"?

[The Tasmanian]

2 Vegemite lids would be much more sophisticated

[wez]

and of course here is the real thing

ummm... modified pasta machine anyone?

[Ben M]

Remember the old printing rollers from school. Oh man we used to sniff that ink up.

[Ben M]

Your probably already ontop of these;

This ones on a half price sale

[attachment=1]Ribbon-corrugator.jpg

http://www.etsy.com/listing/49591528/bo ... orrugating

imagesCAP2BORU.jpg

[Ben M]

This one's for paper corrugating

http://www.papercraftcentral.com/paper-crimper.html

[Ben M]

This one is $65 AUD
http://www.goldsmith-tools.com/

I'll stop now

[stosostu]

Obviously those RCA crimpers work, but I found that all the metal gear type thingos that I tried would cut the foil rather than crimp it, hence the plastic Vegemite lids. I also think that it is beter to have the 'corners' of the corrugations slightly rounded, rather than sharp, which also cuts the ribbon. The corrugations are only there so that you can put some tension on the ribbon (how much is the next question, my experience is not much and it has to be perfected by trial and error) and to allow it to vibrate in the sound field. Even Wes agreed that tensioning the ribbon and setting it in the correct position in the magnetic field is an art rather than a science, maybe even a black art!!!! He also thought that women did it better than men because they have smaller fingers, can be more precise and have more patience. Sounds familiar to me.

[rick]

let me tell you bob
i have tried with out a great deal of success to crack the code of reribboning microphones with any sort of consistency
i have asked "the guys" and they are all secretive about it
i have basically decided over time to send the work out and then i expect to have to send the mic back at least once to have it done again
to have it be a great MIc .
i hate that kind of position .. thus i couldn't generally be bothered with a ribbon mic once i had blown it out a couple of times
i get em fixed up properly and sell them , quite a few guys on the forum have jumped at my discarded ribbons and keep telling me what i favour i did them !

wes was pretty helpful but still he would always answer a different question to the one i asked !
fair enough he has to keep his bread buttered ...
but the ribbons are like guitar strings you have to change them !
its just a fact of life
the new turtlerock will have a large recording studio space and a therefore bunch of ribbons that i like so i figure i just better quit moaning and learn the game

what i do know for sure is for consistency you need a crimper and you need the right foil and you need a steady hand and a keen eye
.. you need some test gear and you need to know what you are doing .

i have tried , and given this weeks success will try some more but its hard
thanks to wes i have gotten better at it in 10 mins then i had in ten years
wes gave me some great insights into the how and why but its really one of those things you have to learn to do

it sounds to me your vegemite tins are just the ticket and way ahead of my efforts any way !
i have been using a camera lens ring it works .. but its a pain

so the deal is done in my mind i am getting a RCA crimper ... or a copy
of coarse its easier to decide your getting one then to actually get one
but you have to start somewhere...

[stosostu]

Rick,

Rolling ribbons is not something I'd want to do for a living, but I do love the sound of ribbon mics and since, at least at this stage, audio is more of a hobby than a business, I have to find low budget, and hence low tech, ways of doing things. However, since that is the case and I don't rely on this business to put dinner on the table, the hours I spend mucking around with stuff are less important.

I would be interested to know if you do aquire a proper crimper and the skills to roll ribbons. There must be a market for them in Oz, though it may be small.

[toddd]

"Rick,

Rolling"

hahaha.

sorry for the flippant post.