3 Nov
2025
3 Nov
'25
5:37 p.m.
On Nov 3, 2025, at 4:32 PM, ben
<bfranchuk(a)jetnet.ab.ca> wrote:
On 2025-11-03 1:04 p.m., Paul Koning wrote:
Yes, but that's unlikely to work. The protective coating is far thinner than the
substrate (0.04 mil vs. 0.92 mil for #481 tape), see
http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/dectape/3M_DECtape_Spec_Nov66.pdf for the details.
paul
Wind it upside down? Not sure what that means.
You could certainly reformat DECtape any time you want, and that would erase it rather
well since the format program writes everything as it does the job. Bulk erase beforehand
would be ok, sure, but I've never seen that done. We had bulk erasers readily
available if we needed them, so it wasn't lack of equipment.
paul
Idea is to flip the tape over, since I expect that facing the head that side would have
the most wear,so you flip the bottom side
that has the least wear up.