Can a regular head cleaner be used for HDV cameras?
More specific: I have Panasonic AY-DVMCLA head cleaners (3), can I use them with Canon A1? or is there a hdv head cleaner available.

Not that I need it, but to be sure not to do something I shouldn't.

Alexis

Can a regular head cleaner be used for HDV cameras?
More specific: I have Panasonic AY-DVMCLA head cleaners (3), can I use them with Canon A1? or is there a hdv head cleaner available.

Not that I need it, but to be sure not to do something I shouldn't.

Alexis

There are no differences in DV and HDV head cleaners, just miniDV cleaners. There are wet and dry types, and just use whatever your camera manual suggests.

Mike

the AY-DVMCLA panasonic cleaner was the one they sold me at the store the A1 was purchased at. I would hope that would be the correct one.

Trish

Trish, Mike's reference to "wet & dry" types is NOT related to the silly wet vs. dry lube processed tape issue.

Using a dry head cleaner just means NOT to use any of those you may see on the market that have a bottle of liquid that's applied to the head cleaning "tape", which usually isn't tape at all... it's usually some kind of cloth base in a cassette shell.

Bill

Trish, Mike's reference to "wet & dry" types is NOT related to the silly wet vs. dry lube processed tape issue.

Using a dry head cleaner just means NOT to use any of those you may see on the market that have a bottle of liquid that's applied to the head cleaning "tape", which usually isn't tape at all... it's usually some kind of cloth base in a cassette shell.

Bill

Actually not true. There are wet and dry head cleaners as well. I use Sony tapes in my cameras, and I use a Sony cleaner to clean them, which I believe is also a wet cleaner. We are not talking about adding a liquid to it, it is already on the tape just as the recording tape is.

I would add one thing and recommend that if you shoot on dry lube tapes then use a dry cleaner. If you shoot on wet tapes, use a wet cleaner.

Mike

I'm reasonably sure you're mistaken. If only I could find this link I came across elsewhere months ago. Thought I saved it in favs.

But, this has been discussed before on the forums as well & I believe Chris even made a comment about it not making a difference which brand is used.

But, regarding manuals, etc... I really do find it deplorable that manufacturers (tape & cams-decks) don't step up & take responsibility with tape packaging, labeling & more thorough explanation in manuals & explain this "wet/dry" crap, as well as what a "dry" head cleaner is.

Do you have a Sony camera? Surely it doesn't say to use a "wet" head cleaner.

I often wonder if anyone has ever sued & won a small claims case against manufacturers regarding either of these wet/dry whatever scenarios because of ruined gear and/or at least flipping the bill for professional head cleaning.

It just has never made sense to me after all these years, not one manufacturer has done anything about this stupidness. :-\

End of rant :)
Bill

*edit* Mike I forgot (that Alzheimers thing :) to ask you. Since the A1's manual suggests to use a "dry" cleaning tape... & YOU are using Sony tapes & head cleaners... isn't that a tad sacreligious? :D

The manual does ask for dry cleaning tapes - and to avoid wet ones - I was told the panasonic tape was a dry one. That it actually acts like tiny sandpaper.

He also went on to say that regular cleaning is no longer needed with the new generation. You should only clean them if needed. Which I haven't heard anywhere else.

trish

I'm reasonably sure you're mistaken. If only I could find this link I came across elsewhere months ago. Thought I saved it in favs.

But, this has been discussed before on the forums as well & I believe Chris even made a comment about it not making a difference which brand is used.

But, regarding manuals, etc... I really do find it deplorable that manufacturers (tape & cams-decks) don't step up & take responsibility with tape packaging, labeling & more thorough explanation in manuals & explain this "wet/dry" crap, as well as what a "dry" head cleaner is.

Do you have a Sony camera? Surely it doesn't say to use a "wet" head cleaner.

I often wonder if anyone has ever sued & won a small claims case against manufacturers regarding either of these wet/dry whatever scenarios because of ruined gear and/or at least flipping the bill for professional head cleaning.

It just has never made sense to me after all these years, not one manufacturer has done anything about this stupidness. :-\

End of rant :)
Bill

*edit* Mike I forgot (that Alzheimers thing :) to ask you. Since the A1's manual suggests to use a "dry" cleaning tape... & YOU are using Sony tapes & head cleaners... isn't that a tad sacreligious? :D

Bill,

Ya, call me a rebel! I use Sony wet tapes in my Canon cameras and Sony wet cleaners too! But, I have never had a dropout, how many can say that?

I totally agree that we need better information on the packaging. You will find nothing on most packages. I believe my Sony cleaner tape actually said wet on the wrapping, but after you open it, there is no mention after that. My XLH1 manual actually says not to use a wet cleaner tape, but since I use wet tapes to begin with, I do.

I just meant, on mixing, that if you use wet tapes you should not use a dry cleaner and vice versa. Just common sense I think.

The manufactures want some way to say the problem is yours so they choose which tape. If Canon ever started to make tape, which will never happen, I would love to see if they used wet or dry.

Mike

I would take the "not required on the new generation" remark with a grain of salt, and a big grain for that matter. I definitely would not wait for the message "clean video heads" to show up on the LCD before I pop in a cleaning cassette.

As a side question to everyone - how often do you use cleaning tape on your A1 (after how many tapes)?

The manual does ask for dry cleaning tapes - and to avoid wet ones - I was told the panasonic tape was a dry one. That it actually acts like tiny sandpaper.

He also went on to say that regular cleaning is no longer needed with the new generation. You should only clean them if needed. Which I haven't heard anywhere else.

trish

I wonder what the "D" stands for in Sony's DVM-12CLD <- :D

Bill

the AY-DVMCLA panasonic cleaner was the one they sold me at the store the A1 was purchased at. I would hope that would be the correct one.

Trish

Hi Trish,

It took a while to get authenticated on the forum, so apologies if you've already received an answer to your concern above. Printed on the cardboard insert of my AY-DVMCLA tape, it says, "Dry Type", so I'm pretty sure we're ok!

It's good to know on the dry. thanks Julian. : )

I'm also wondering how often people clean the heads. Haven't found a consistent answer on it.

trish

I bought my first DV camcorder two years ago (Canon Elura 65). Used it for about a year and bought a second camcorder (Canon Elura 100) and have use it for about a year. Now I own a third camcorder (Canon HV20). Maybe I'm lucky, maybe I'm just plain stupid when it comes to camcorders but I have never cleaned heads. I probably shot over 50 tapes on each of the first two and have run them all the tapes through at least once or twice for capturing and editing.

I read about so many people discussing cleaning camcorder tape heads I thought maybe I better go by one. Like a dummy, I didn't look at the manual. I never heard about wet & dri mindv tapes. I've just been purchasing what was convenient from Walmart. I would say about 80% of my tapes are Sony Premium from Walmart. I think the others have been JVC, Maxell, & TDK. Have I ruined my first two cameras do you think. I probably will be shooting 90% of my video now on the HV20 but I was thinking of doing some multiangle shots with my older cameras. Maybe since my plan is to shoot only HD now even if I downgrade some video to SD in post.

My question is first, did I screw up when I paid about $25 at Best Buy for a minidv cleaner manufactured by Dynex? I just got it out of the bag & I don't see anything about wet or dri on the package. I will say that now that I've read several people mention that it is advisable to never switch brands of tape, I'll just stick with purchasing Sony Premium. I'm sure that is all that I've used so for on my HV20. I've only shot an hour an a half so for. I'm holding an unopened Sony Premium tape in my hands and nowhere on the package does it indicate wet or dri. The package says it is a DMV60PRL if that means anything to anyone. So my bottom line is:

1. Should I toss my $25 Dynex tape and get another one.
2. If so what should I purchase since I'm planning on using the Sony Premium tapes mentioned above. I have about 50 of them on the shelf (yes I shoot a lot of music festival). Please don't tell me I should get rid of them.
3. How often should I run the cleaning tape through my camera.

Consider I have worked on computers for over 37 years, and I never blink an eye when I see an occasional glitch. Working with camcorders - Maybe it was a drop out than again maybe it was an occasional glitch. Like the old saying s!#$ happens once in awhile that you can't explain and it's a waste of time chasing after it or trying to explain it. When I take a service call on a computer, the first thing I ask is - "Is your problem repeatable?" Can you show me? If it isn't or they say it might happen once a week or something like that, I tell them they will probably have to live with it unless they want to give me their computer for a day so I can reubild it (back their data up, inventory their apps, format & partition the hard disk that contains the OS, restore the OS, re-install the apps, restore their data, & reconfigure their profile.

That's my take on things. I'll wait for some advice. Oh, one other thing I have learned from many years of doing P.M.s, "if it ain't broke don't fix it, but change your oil in your car often."

Thanks in advance.

Trish, a long time ago in my Betacam SP shooting days a Sony service tech recommended using the head cleaning tape every 50 hours. I've been doing that with DVCAM cameras too and never have dropouts. With the XH A1 I used the head cleaning tape once when I got the camera and will probably use it again after 50 hours, or if needed before then.

Thanks Bill.

I'll go for the 50 hour estimate. Would that calculate in playback time on the head as well - ie, the capture process, reviewing the footage. Or 50 hours of taping only

A possibly dump question I know.

trish

50 hours is 50 hours, which ever way the signal's travelling through the head windings.

I've always done it after 50 hours of record time.

Another thought. If you keep re-using your tapes you'll generally need to use the head cleaner less frequently. Every new tape sheds minute particles on the first pass, and the second pass will give the cleanest (i.e. least dropout) recordings.

tom.

In my DV days, which are not too long gone, I've never recorded a tape over; always used a new tape.

How long before the tape starts wearing off from constant friction and dropouts show up? Anybody has experience with recording the same tape over and over again?
Another thought. If you keep re-using your tapes you'll generally need to use the head cleaner less frequently. Every new tape sheds minute particles on the first pass, and the second pass will give the cleanest (i.e. least dropout) recordings.

tom.

You've always used a new tape Maksim? You mean you work for a client and entrust the day's shooting to untried, untested $3 components? You'd never dream of taking an untested microphone on the shoot, and that costs hundreds of dollars, so how can you unwrap a $3 tape and be sure it's 100% ok? At that price you're not paying for any sort of inspection, you're living on a prayer.

Me - I've had experience of recording the same tape over and over again. There's very little friction in the tape path as rollers (even the capstan and pinch) revolve at relative zero to tape travel and a minute air cushion separates the spinning drum from the emulsion.

tom.

I ordered a head cleaner from the supplier where I purchased my A1 and they sent me one of these...

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/191741-REG/Sony_PDVM12CL_PDVM_12CL_Cleaning_Cassette_Small_.html

Can anyone confirm if this will be okay for use with my camera? Bit confused about the whole DVCAM / MINI DV thing and the tape is labeled as a DVCAM head cleaning cassette.

Thanks

Paul

It's absolutely fine Paul, but you're rather paying over the odds because it's labelled DVCAM. Of course a MiniDV cassette deck doesn't care whether it's LP, SP, DVCAM or DVCPRO, it's just a tape deck. And you can use a head cleaning tape made by anyone - Maxell, JVC, Panasonic, Canon - you name it.

Of course this head cleaning tape is just that and no more. It won't do a thing for the myriad of pins, guides and rollers that revolve in zero-relativity as the tape passes them. For that you'll need to do a tape path clean.

tom.

Thanks Tom, much appreciated.

Paul.

You've always used a new tape Maksim? You mean you work for a client and entrust the day's shooting to untried, untested $3 components? You'd never dream of taking an untested microphone on the shoot, and that costs hundreds of dollars, so how can you unwrap a $3 tape and be sure it's 100% ok? At that price you're not paying for any sort of inspection, you're living on a prayer.

Me - I've had experience of recording the same tape over and over again. There's very little friction in the tape path as rollers (even the capstan and pinch) revolve at relative zero to tape travel and a minute air cushion separates the spinning drum from the emulsion.

tom.

How can you be 100% sure your "multi-pass" are going to be error free? :)

Bill

Hi, Tom.

Yes, I've always used a new tape. I have not used $3 tapes on important projects where there were no second takes; in such cases I used more expensive tapes in hopes for better quality control. You are 100% correct in saying that even new tapes can exhibit dropouts. However, once you take a new tape and use it several times, you are introducing more variables such as natural tape wear from friction and tension and so on. These factors take time to start causing quality issues, however they do cause tape damage. My thinking was that a brand-new tape that has not experienced wear yet has a better chance of not having dropouts than the same tape that was already put to use.

As far as using untested microphones, of course I would never dream of going to a shoot like this. In fact, I am being paranoid at times checking and re-checking equipment once and again. However, items like microphones do contain large amount of electronics and therefore are much more prone to quality problems. I figured the industry learned to apply magnetic layer to a polymer with a reasonably high level of quality; otherwise, we are really in trouble.

You've always used a new tape Maksim? You mean you work for a client and entrust the day's shooting to untried, untested $3 components? You'd never dream of taking an untested microphone on the shoot, and that costs hundreds of dollars, so how can you unwrap a $3 tape and be sure it's 100% ok? At that price you're not paying for any sort of inspection, you're living on a prayer.

Me - I've had experience of recording the same tape over and over again. There's very little friction in the tape path as rollers (even the capstan and pinch) revolve at relative zero to tape travel and a minute air cushion separates the spinning drum from the emulsion.

tom.

Bill, you can never be 100% sure of anything. Your health, your car getting you there, your watch not lying to you, your heads not clogging.

Okay, here's something for the tape/cleaning debate mix:

11 months and thirty reels of Sony PHDVM-63DM tape in to using my Z1, it chews up two tapes on playback (crimped along one edge). Sent back to Sony under warranty, they say the heads and the pinch rollers were 'extremely dirty'.

SO dirty in fact that, rather than clean them, they put in a whole new deck.
Which was nice.

Now, folks will laugh and no doubt cry about this, but I'd never used the cleaning tape (must have done around 70 hours on the heads). On the other hand, there were never any problems with the footage - no blocks or drops, no tape errors, nothing.

I asked the engineers at Sony what could cause this. Dodgy tape batch I say? Yes, say Sony.

One new camera deck later, the second tape through has a whopping 4 minute dropout twelve minutes in (timecode lapses in and out, no picture, no sound). I had bought a new brick of PHDVM tapes but, on checking the serials, sure enough one from the old batch had sneaked into my camera bag.

Looking at the surface of the tape where the mega-dropout is, I can see vertical bands about 3mm apart and 1mm thick of Bob knows what on the surface of the tape.

Supplier assures me their batches come straight from Sony UK and have 'never heard of anything like this' (ditto the camera supplier).

From the same batch of ten, two have droputs and two are now physically beyond use. The one with the banding on that still plays will be going back to the supplier for examination the instant I get the chance to make a dupe from the captured footage - I don't fancy running whatever's on there over any of my heads again (bought an M15E deck to take strain of the camera).

In case anyone is feeling paranoid about their stock, the serials of the affected tapes are

54DA4911H 1113
54DA4911H 1114

Anyone out there got a similar story?

JW

Quite a story John, and you must be tearing your hair in exasperation. Camcorders with DV tape mechanisms generally show signs of needing a tape path clean (as against a far simpler head clean) when a fine ring of emulsion gunge builds up at the base of the capstan, about 1 mm up from the main bearing.

It's pretty easy to spot. You open the cassette door and in good light (focused Maglight or LED) look at the capstan directly opposite the rubber pinch roller. If it's bright as a new pin all should be well, but at the first sign of a buildup, tape crinkle is not far away.

tom.

Camcorders with DV tape mechanisms generally show signs of needing a tape path clean (as against a far simpler head clean) when a fine ring of emulsion gunge builds up at the base of the capstan, about 1 mm up from the main bearing.


Great advice, Tom - now logged in my ever-growing 'crucial details manuals don't tell you' bin.

You can probably hear the next couple of questions coming:

A) is a 'tape path clean' a pro engineer's job?
and
B) why might this have happened (seemingly) so quickly?

best

jw

A) Not necessarily. I do it on my tape decks but only when needed. Did you ever clean a VHS VCR's tape path? Great training ground.

B) Have you mixed tapes at all? Someone before you run a JVC / Maxell through the camera maybe? 'Choose a tape and stick to it' moto has kept my decks shiney-bright longer.

It could be - just as you say - a bad batch. I buy Sony Premiums for £1.35 a tape and paying that price for 28 highly complex and accurately made components means there's nothing left for inspection. Some will be duff, it's the law of the land.

tom.

A) Nope - but I know of a manky old Ferguson Videostar (still in use!) that would surely benefit from a bit of TLC

B) Z1 was split new last April and I've only ever used Sony PHDVM-63 DM tapes in there - have had stock mixing issues on other heads/productions.

Looks like a bad batch then, which begs the question why am I paying an average £10 a cart for 'master' quality tapes?!

(That's a rhetorical question btw - I've read all about the S/N benefits before).

I will keep hassling Sony and the vendor about this. No liabilities warrantied, I know, with regards to lost footage but I feel I at least should get a refund for the bad carts under the 'not fit for purpose as sold' principle.

Thanks again for the tips.

best

jw

Yes, certainly go after a refund as I'm pretty sure Sony will be well arare of the problem with your batch.

As to the signal:noise ratio claim - you're joking, right? In digital the cheapest tape is every bit as good as the dearest. LP, SP and DVCAM all record exactly the same pictures and sound. Paying more simply means you're hoping for less dropout.

Not so in your case John.

tom.

Re. S/N claim: wasn't joking but I think we're saying the same thing in the end.

I know that digital is digital but am sure I read a post recently where someone had demonstrated that more errors make the error correction features of the HDV format work harder.

If the errors get too much for the software, then a dropout occurs. Shooting HDV means I'm in GOP land where a corrupted frame could mean losing all the others in the group that hang off it and result in a much longer period of dropout than with non-GOP formats.

Made sense to me at least. This, of course, is working to the (possibly erroneous) assumption that a greater degree of 'noise' means a greater likelihood of errors.

Of course, none of this has much to do with hulking great bands of crap turning up on the emulsion!

As you're in the UK, I wonder if you know of any tape rescue facilities geared up to address material shot in HDV?

I'll take it the crinkled ones are gone forever but I have another that's become divorced from its take-up reel and another where something funky has happened to the tension and it won't play.

Would still rather pay someone else to mess up their transport than risk any of my own in what might be a fruitless exercise...

Cheers again

jw

Trish,

A word from Canon Rep I got a hold of and talked with in person several days ago (he was visiting my local video store) specifically on XH-A1 was that Canon does not recommend using cleaning tapes until the "heads dirty" message pops up. In his words, any regular use of cleaning tapes is just "sanding the heads".

Thanks Bill.

I'll go for the 50 hour estimate. Would that calculate in playback time on the head as well - ie, the capture process, reviewing the footage. Or 50 hours of taping only

A possibly dump question I know.

trish

I'm new to this forum and I want to send a a big "ciao" to all members.
I'm from Italy - city: Napoli

I own a PANASONIC DX100 since August 1998 and I never used a cleaning tape.
In hundreds of operations hours I have encountered only 2-3 dropouts.

But note I have always used new or almost new tapes, stored in dry, cool and dark places full rewinded to start. The camera itself is always stored closed in its bag, during shooting pause too.

You're spot on with your GOP talk John, and sorry, I don't have any experience with retrieval agencies here. Of course dropouts will have a far greater detrimental effect on MPEG2 recordings than on plain DV, which is why you've been tempted to pay 8x over the odds to limit the times this occurs. Getting a one hour SD tape to hold one hour of HiDef doesn't come without compromises and side-effects.

You've been sold landfill tapes, so back to Sony Premiums, I say. And like you, I'd keep dodgy tapes well away from my delicate tape deck mechanisms.

tom.

Can I get an opinion from you guys on the following:-

I purchased a couple of the Sony Digital Master tapes with my A1 and as I've been waiting for new tapes to be delivered I've reused both tapes a couple of times while experimenting with the camera. The thing about these tapes though is that they cost around £15 each! After reading lots of good things about the Panasonic AMQ tapes I've purchased five of them at £5 each, a good saving over the Sony's.

Do you think running a head cleaner will be enough for me to switch tapes now, or am I likely to run into problems after having the Sony's in there? At £10 difference I'm sure it would actually be more cost effective to have the camera cleaned before switching to the AMQ's than to keep using the Sony's :)

Paul.

Most of the threads I've read suggest it's better sticking ot one tape for the life of the kit - there's more than just the head in the equation to get messed up. A few quid per cart won't feel like much of a discount if you end up with blocky, droppy footage or a tape jam.

ProTape do a better price on the Sony tapes than that in the UK and deliver next day (no I'm not on their payroll!).

Last 10 PHDVM63-DM I bought came to £113 including Vat and shipping.

jw

If you just run the head cleaning tape for about 5 seconds before switching to the AMQ tapes, you should be OK. That's what I did and I haven't seen a single dropout in probably 25-30 tapes recorded so far. It's not a big deal, really. What you don't want to do is switch back and forth a lot.

I've used Sony DVCAM tapes for years with no trouble at all, but with the XH A1 I decided to switch to the Panasonic AMQ tapes because of recommendations from one dealer who's sold a lot of XL H1 and XH A1 cameras. He said most of his customers use the AMQs and have no trouble, and lots of them shoot under adverse conditions. I've always been a bit of a fanatic about good quality tape, but there's a difference between buying good tape and throwing away money. The Sony equivalents to the AMQs are close to double in price, and that's ridiculous in my opinion.

There's a lot of hype about tape, and both brands have published information citing all sorts of data about why theirs is best. From what I've seen, both from the dealer I mentioned and with people locally shooting HDV, the Panasonic AMQs seem to be becoming the tape of choice. Not that I'm trying to pimp Panasonic; I'm sticking with DVCAM tape for the DVCAM cameras.

Trish,

A word from Canon Rep I got a hold of and talked with in person several days ago (he was visiting my local video store) specifically on XH-A1 was that Canon does not recommend using cleaning tapes until the "heads dirty" message pops up. In his words, any regular use of cleaning tapes is just "sanding the heads".


That's pretty much what the manager at the store explained originally. With the newer cameras you don't need to clean them unless there's a problem, but I don't know what the difference in tech on the decks are with the new versus older models.

Trish