SONY SRA - 2 TUBE Recording Amplifier &TC - 263D Reel - To - Reel Deck With SWTPC Preamp
Item History & Price
| Reference Number: Avaluer:51290072 | Brand: Sony |
| Type: Tape Recorder | Modified Item: Yes |
| Country/Region of Manufacture: Japan | Model: sra-2 |
| UPC: Does not apply |
SONY SRA-2 TUBE Recording Amplifier &TC-263D Reel-to-Reel Deck with SWTPC Preamp. Condition is "Used".
Included here are Sony SRA-2 Recording Amplifier in excellent condition, with power cord and one Sony RK-56 cable, Sony TC-263D 3-head, two-speed tape deck in working condition, with two Southwest Technical Products #195 preamps for the playback head, and an unfinished pine cabinet, plus documentation.Sony TC-263D: This is a 2-speed (7.5 ips and 3.75 ips), quarter-track stereo ...reel-to-reel deck, accepting up to 7 inch reels. It has three stereo heads- erase, record, and play. It is very old and has been in storage since the early 1980’s. This month I did general cleanup and lube of the chassis so I could check out the recording amplifier. See interior photos showing the mechanism and the heads. For now, after cleanup, all functions work well! However, all the rubber idlers, the capstan pressure roller, and the two small belts used in the tape counter are many years old and need more focused renewal efforts. If they continue to be exercised, everything may work fine for some time, but things will get sluggish if neglected! To my amazement, the wow and flutter I measured on this old chassis easily met Sony’s original specs at both speeds. Built well! Cosmetically the deck is in good shape, except that most of the original function markings for the control levers have worn off the brushed-aluminum faceplate (see photos).
These decks are often seen with missing or broken control levers – levers were made of plastic, and crumbled or cracked over time. On this deck, I have adapted and fitted a set of METAL control levers from an earlier Sony deck series, so they will NEVER break.
The stock TC-263D is just a tape transport and 3 stereo heads – there is no preamp in it. Back in the late 70’s I modified this deck to include a stereo playback preamplifier, using two Southwest Technical Products #195 discrete opamp preamplifiers, inspired by an article in The Audio Amateur magazine (1972 Issue #1). This modification eliminates the problem of needing an external tape head preamplifier for playback; instead you get a line-level output from the original play head jacks. The circuit includes the two preamps, a switchable playback equalization network for each speed (switch added to the back plate- see photos), with adjustments so it can be “tweaked”, and a small zener-regulated power supply to run the preamps. See the photos- all this fits neatly into the fairly-empty TC-263D chassis. Although I don’t have a schematic drawn for all this, it is all copied from the articles and instructions I am providing, so a hobbyist can figure this out pretty well, I think. Listening to the preamps, they still sound nice, although there is a little more hum in the right channel than I remember hearing before – so it may now need some capacitor replacements.I am also including an unfinished pine cabinet for the deck, see the photos. This can be finished as you choose. Something I never got around to doing!
Sony SRA-2 Recording Amplifier: This is an ALL-TUBE stereo recording amplifier which connects to the record and erase heads of the TC-263D. I am including one original Sony RK-56 low-capacity cable that should be used for the record head connection. Use the best cable you can find for the erase head (Sony says RG-59 cable is good). The recording amplifier tube complement is 2 x 12AX7, 1 x 12AT7, 1 x 12BH7, 1 x 6X4, and 2 x 6DA5 “magic eye” tubes for metering. All tubes are Matsushita and NEC types and are probably the originals. I tested all tubes, they are excellent, and the “magic eye” meters are sharp and bright. The preamp is quiet with tons of gain and works as it should. This preamp could be converted to a nice-sounding stereo high gain mic preamp unit, if the 12BH7 bias oscillator tube is removed and input mic transformers are added, but I really hope it will be purchased to use for recording tape as it was intended! Cosmetically it is very clean with very few scratches or scuffs. Inside, two resistors have been experimentally added to make the circuit more compatible with the TC-263D heads. I am including a schematic showing the change, which is easily reversed. More adjustments may be necessary to use this unit with the 263D - I’ll leave that for the hobbyist! It does record using this deck, but probably not as well as it should.
Documentation: Included in this sale is a color copy of the SRA-2 Owners’ Manual, a copy of the 1972 Audio Amateur Magazine article upon which the preamplifier was based, and a copy of the original Southwest Technical Products Corporation No. 195 Preamp assembly instructions. This was a fun project from years and years ago, and I hope is of interest to a modern audiotape experimenter!This equipment is being sold as-is. I have described it as well as I can. Everything you see in the photos is included, EXCEPT the reels of tape which are just there to demonstrate operation.
Happy bidding!
Included here are Sony SRA-2 Recording Amplifier in excellent condition, with power cord and one Sony RK-56 cable, Sony TC-263D 3-head, two-speed tape deck in working condition, with two Southwest Technical Products #195 preamps for the playback head, and an unfinished pine cabinet, plus documentation.Sony TC-263D: This is a 2-speed (7.5 ips and 3.75 ips), quarter-track stereo ...reel-to-reel deck, accepting up to 7 inch reels. It has three stereo heads- erase, record, and play. It is very old and has been in storage since the early 1980’s. This month I did general cleanup and lube of the chassis so I could check out the recording amplifier. See interior photos showing the mechanism and the heads. For now, after cleanup, all functions work well! However, all the rubber idlers, the capstan pressure roller, and the two small belts used in the tape counter are many years old and need more focused renewal efforts. If they continue to be exercised, everything may work fine for some time, but things will get sluggish if neglected! To my amazement, the wow and flutter I measured on this old chassis easily met Sony’s original specs at both speeds. Built well! Cosmetically the deck is in good shape, except that most of the original function markings for the control levers have worn off the brushed-aluminum faceplate (see photos).
These decks are often seen with missing or broken control levers – levers were made of plastic, and crumbled or cracked over time. On this deck, I have adapted and fitted a set of METAL control levers from an earlier Sony deck series, so they will NEVER break.
The stock TC-263D is just a tape transport and 3 stereo heads – there is no preamp in it. Back in the late 70’s I modified this deck to include a stereo playback preamplifier, using two Southwest Technical Products #195 discrete opamp preamplifiers, inspired by an article in The Audio Amateur magazine (1972 Issue #1). This modification eliminates the problem of needing an external tape head preamplifier for playback; instead you get a line-level output from the original play head jacks. The circuit includes the two preamps, a switchable playback equalization network for each speed (switch added to the back plate- see photos), with adjustments so it can be “tweaked”, and a small zener-regulated power supply to run the preamps. See the photos- all this fits neatly into the fairly-empty TC-263D chassis. Although I don’t have a schematic drawn for all this, it is all copied from the articles and instructions I am providing, so a hobbyist can figure this out pretty well, I think. Listening to the preamps, they still sound nice, although there is a little more hum in the right channel than I remember hearing before – so it may now need some capacitor replacements.I am also including an unfinished pine cabinet for the deck, see the photos. This can be finished as you choose. Something I never got around to doing!
Sony SRA-2 Recording Amplifier: This is an ALL-TUBE stereo recording amplifier which connects to the record and erase heads of the TC-263D. I am including one original Sony RK-56 low-capacity cable that should be used for the record head connection. Use the best cable you can find for the erase head (Sony says RG-59 cable is good). The recording amplifier tube complement is 2 x 12AX7, 1 x 12AT7, 1 x 12BH7, 1 x 6X4, and 2 x 6DA5 “magic eye” tubes for metering. All tubes are Matsushita and NEC types and are probably the originals. I tested all tubes, they are excellent, and the “magic eye” meters are sharp and bright. The preamp is quiet with tons of gain and works as it should. This preamp could be converted to a nice-sounding stereo high gain mic preamp unit, if the 12BH7 bias oscillator tube is removed and input mic transformers are added, but I really hope it will be purchased to use for recording tape as it was intended! Cosmetically it is very clean with very few scratches or scuffs. Inside, two resistors have been experimentally added to make the circuit more compatible with the TC-263D heads. I am including a schematic showing the change, which is easily reversed. More adjustments may be necessary to use this unit with the 263D - I’ll leave that for the hobbyist! It does record using this deck, but probably not as well as it should.
Documentation: Included in this sale is a color copy of the SRA-2 Owners’ Manual, a copy of the 1972 Audio Amateur Magazine article upon which the preamplifier was based, and a copy of the original Southwest Technical Products Corporation No. 195 Preamp assembly instructions. This was a fun project from years and years ago, and I hope is of interest to a modern audiotape experimenter!This equipment is being sold as-is. I have described it as well as I can. Everything you see in the photos is included, EXCEPT the reels of tape which are just there to demonstrate operation.
Happy bidding!
