Sony Elcaset EL-7

howie123

Stuck in the '70s
Here are some pics of my Sony Elcaset EL-7, which I purchased in late 1980. This deck originally sold for close to $1000, but by 1980, the Elcaset format was pretty much dead and most existing stock was sold off to a supplier in Finland. A local audio shop here in Northern New Jersey managed to get a few brand new EL-5 and EL-7 decks and sold them off for $80 and $100 respectively. At that time, I had a couple of decent cassette decks and just bought this due to the great price. It's a 3 head, 3-motor, closed-loop dual capstan deck and was the top of the line when these things were sold (1976-80). The format never really caught on due to the price of the decks and the Compact Cassette had already become a mainstay in most people's stereo systems. It's a shame, really, as the quality of the recordings made on it (using FeCr tape) equaled many reel-to-reel units running at twice the speed. I recently took it out of storage and it is now is part of my system that I recently resurrected (Kenwood KR-9600 receiver, Sony PS-3750 turntable). The recordings sound fantastic and the three head design allows you to hear the tape as it's being recorded. I had purchased a case of 12 LC-60 FeCr tapes for $20 with the deck and hopefully I'll be able to enjoy it for a long time to come. There are probably more than a few AK members who have never even heard of (or seen) one of these so I thought I'd share a few pictures... :)
 

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Yep, another great format that didn't catch on. It was a little before my time, so I never got into this format. Deck looks nice! Thanks for posting. :)
 
Yep, another great format that didn't catch on. It was a little before my time, so I never got into this format. Deck looks nice! Thanks for posting. :)

You're welcome! :)

I had gotten caught up in the "digital revolution" in the mid-80's and at some point in that era packed up my analog stuff (the Elcaset deck, my Kenwood KR-9600, a Sony turntable and a few other items) and listened to CD's on digital tuning receivers with remote controls. I recently unpacked this old stuff after finding AK and I had forgotten just how good the old analog stuff sounds. I'm glad I did! :)
 
I was lucky enough to aquire a couple hundred cassettes to play on my EL-7's that I have. Too bad the cassettes are so hard to find and so expensive if you do find any. Sometimes you can get lucky but it still isn't an inexpensive format to play with.
 
I picked up one of these at the weekend (EL7). First impressions: The deck itself is a fantastic piece of engineering, direct drive spool motors etc and with sound that reminds me of my TC766-2 R2R. Sony's 70's tape decks really do sound great!
The tape cassettes themselves are the weak link though as some of them squeal like mad.
 
The EL-7 was a superb machine. It's too bad that the format was so short lived. To campare the Sonics to the TC766-2 is not small praise, IMO.

Regarding the tapes: Try baking them in a food dehytrator for about 6 hours. I'll bet that your squeaking stops (for a while at least).
 
Goldear,
It's a mechanical squeal from the tape shell. Is baking the right solution? I'd hate to expose the tape to heat unnecessarily.
I've seen that you are also a fan of big Sony R2Rs, so you'll understand me when I say they have a warm effortless sound to them. The EL7 sounds this way too in my opinion. I've sadly never had a Sony cassette deck, I wonder if they sound this way too?
 
I don't think that I've ever seen an ElCaset machine in person (it just struck me that it might go well with my ElCamino :D).

All joking aside, I can't ever recall seeing one. Research reveals that they didn't appear until 1976, started to fade away in 1978 and was completely abandoned in 1980.

That explains why I never saw one. By 1976, I had graduated from Engineering School and was working for the Power Company. I won't say that I wasn't paying attention to audio gear then, but my primary focus was certainly elsewhere for those years, and the town I lived in had only mass marketers and no specialty retailer for audio gear! :sigh:

At first when you stated that "the quality of recordings made on it.....equalled many reel to reel units running at twice the speed", I was thinking that you had probably never owned a nice RTR for a true comparison. But after learning that the ElCaset used 1/4" tape, ran at 3 3/4 ips and extracted the tape from the cartridge much as a VCR does, it certainly seems that it would be every bit the equal of a RTR at 3 3/4 and perhaps of some at 7 1/2 ips as well!

My research indicated that it was felt that the continued improvement of the standard cassette was as much of a factor in the death of the elcaset as anything else. It would seem that there was probably little potential for it's use in automotive applications either, due to the size of the cartridge.

I enjoyed your pictures, especially the comparison between the size of the elcaset tape and a standard cassette tape. I can only imagine how scarce the tapes must be. Even if one found a nice elcaset deck at the GW or SA, the hunt for media must be maddening!

You certainly have your own candidate for the Howie123 "Museum of Modern Electronics" :yes:

Thanks for posting, very informative! :thmbsp:
 
I don't think that I've ever seen an ElCaset machine in person (it just struck me that it might go well with my ElCamino :D).

All joking aside, I can't ever recall seeing one. Research reveals that they didn't appear until 1976, started to fade away in 1978 and was completely abandoned in 1980.

That explains why I never saw one. By 1976, I had graduated from Engineering School and was working for the Power Company. I won't say that I wasn't paying attention to audio gear then, but my primary focus was certainly elsewhere for those years, and the town I lived in had only mass marketers and no specialty retailer for audio gear! :sigh:

At first when you stated that "the quality of recordings made on it.....equalled many reel to reel units running at twice the speed", I was thinking that you had probably never owned a nice RTR for a true comparison. But after learning that the ElCaset used 1/4" tape, ran at 3 3/4 ips and extracted the tape from the cartridge much as a VCR does, it certainly seems that it would be every bit the equal of a RTR at 3 3/4 and perhaps of some at 7 1/2 ips as well!

My research indicated that it was felt that the continued improvement of the standard cassette was as much of a factor in the death of the elcaset as anything else. It would seem that there was probably little potential for it's use in automotive applications either, due to the size of the cartridge.

I enjoyed your pictures, especially the comparison between the size of the elcaset tape and a standard cassette tape. I can only imagine how scarce the tapes must be. Even if one found a nice elcaset deck at the GW or SA, the hunt for media must be maddening!

You certainly have your own candidate for the Howie123 "Museum of Modern Electronics" :yes:

Thanks for posting, very informative! :thmbsp:
The First time I ever saw an elcasset the format was already dead. I beleive it was 1984. I was extremely impressed with what I heard at the time. I don't know if ti was a Sony EL-5 or an EL-7 for certain. But I think that it was an EL-7, because I'm pretty sure that it had three heads.

And actually, even though it ran at 3.75 ips and ran 1/4 track tape, it actually significantly outperformed 3.75ips R2R by a significant margin. The performance was actually much closer to 7.5 ips reel to reel on one of the better Sonys.

The reason why it sounded better at 3.75 ips than did R2R, even despite the same speed and track-width, was that it used different heads. It used heads that had gap-widths that were optimized for 3.75 ips, rather than open reel heads which are usually optimized for best frequency response at 7.5 or 15 ips (depending upon the machine). The heads also had side-by side tracks, like cassette, rather then staggered like R2R.

The EL-7 was spec'ed at having a response from 25 Hz to 22kHz +-3dB at 3.75 ips, which is better than most R2Rs running at that same speed, and had a W&F spec of .04%, which is pretty good as well.
 
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