Just used your method to clean my parents' wedding video that was horribly overgrown with mould. It turned out great and I digitised it after, even though this was the copy and I found the original tape in pristine condition in another box nearby shortly after! Great tutorial all the same!
@@tossik1647 I followed The Oldskool PC's video on digitising tapes with VirtualDub, but feel free to check around and see what works for you: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-sn_TDa9zY1c.html&ab_channel=TheOldskoolPC
Great vid! Haven't read all the comments to find out if anyone's brought this up, but I've had extra crusty tapes break during cleaning, because of sticking. To avoid this now, I'll let a valuable tape run through at regular playback speed to knock the heavy mold off and allow the tape to separate from the rest of the spool. I vacuum that out of the VCR then clean the tape as you describe here.
Years ago (after Tropical Storm Allison put much of Houston underwater) I had a plan and put it to action (without getting the idea from anyone) and it surprises me that I pull up videos that reminds me of what I did!!!...saved my collection. Great minds think alike.😄
THANK YOU! My mom's basement got flooded and our family videos were moldy like this and we were devastated. Cleaned them like you showed and they work like a charm! So wonderful! Can't express how grateful we are for your video!
Easy and perfect. Thanks for teaching me this trick. It helped relieve much anxiety at the situation I have. And it also showed me I caught the mold just in time.
My man with the champion edition VHS cleaning tutorial. Thanks a lot! My Ma and Pa left me a ton of tapes and they all have a bit of mold so I got work to do.
I recommend to NOT use a cotton swap to apply the alcohol, cotton fibers can be left behind and get transferred to the tape. Defeating the purpose of using a microfiber cloth.
I clean both sides at the same time, by using a cleaning bad folded over between my thumb and finger. Much more efficient. However, when I try cleaning with Isopropyl in the manner you use, I have found that the tape layers can stick togther. I do it dry, and clean by hand any hard bits of mould that don't come off with a pass like that. If it's a bad and 'crusty' bit it will need going over repeatedly with Isporopyl to shift it. I take the tape apart before I start, after I've ff'd it, and again at the end.
Thank you so much for your video. I spent $500 having 6 out of 25 VHS/ Hi-8 tapes transferred to DVD. The service slapped stickers on the originals stating that they could not transfer due to mold on analog tapes. My kid’s videos of their births could not be transferred. I was devastated until I watched your video. Many, many thanks. I’ll give this a try
Who the hell charged you $500 for just 6 tapes? I do VHS to DVD or digital transfers for people all the time and only charge $10 per tape. You got charged way too much.
@@ThexthSurvivor The original comment said 25 tapes for 500. $20 per tape is actually on the low end if someone is using a professional workflow vs something like a Elgato
Hi there This is a wonderful upload. I'm very happy to have come across it. I am about to begin digitizing all of our family VHS tapes. I wanted to ask you a question. The cleaning your doing that isn't the magnetic tape itself (the inside of the casing etc), is that nessicary for the quality of film or is it to protect against future mold outbreaks? I'll likely throw the tapes once I've digitized so I don't need to protect for longevity Thank you
Thanks for doing this. I've thankfully only ever had a few tapes with mold but they were not worth the work involved. BUT if there's ever a rare, hard-to-replace tape with mold, I will definitely use your method.
I've got a 60 tape challenge ahead of me, some like this and sone much worse. I wondered whether you could clean both sides of the tape at the same time, then still give it two passes. I have a spare old VCR as my 'cleaning rig" so only clean tapes go near my decent VCR. As soon as they're clean I'm digitizing everything, then the tapes can all finally go, but not until I have a backup of everything, just in case. Will practice opening up and cleaning a couple of test tapes to get the hang of it first, then get a routine going. Thanks for sharing.
You should use an older VCR which does not have the tape laced round the drum in fast wind. That way you don't risk contaminating the whole tape path with mould or harming the heads
Awesome tutorial, thanks a lot! I have a question, please: I only could find in my country stores (local or Amazon) Isopropyl Alcohol 99,9%, not Isopropyl Rubbing Alcohol 91%... could this be used, or would it damage the tape?
Glad i found this video. Starting to collected animated movies/shows and as i was cleaning out a shelf that was no good, turns out a few tapes have caught mold. luckily their not so hard to find for a reasonable price, but i definetly will invest into another old VCR and convert it into a cleaner, just in case i run into a issue where a tape is hard to find/expensive
Before and after showing the tape played would have been nice. My home VHS tapes don't have clear windows so I have no idea if mold is causing the to look all messed up.
If the reel is damaged in the middle you will see lines fading in and out sadly this is impossible to fix, no way round fixing this, this happens if the reel is poor quality or the tape got jammed in your VCR and screwed the tape reel. Do not use a VCR that is of low quality stick to ones made by Panasonic, HS860 or NV Series they are reliable.
I have been doing this for 6+ years for clients. I live near the coast with high amounts of humidity (lots of mold). It usually improves the tapes by 50-90%. There are rare cases where the mold does damage the tape beyond repair. Its time consuming but worth the results.
@@masongovender9231 Hi mould can damage the reel or recording of a tape, if the video or tape is important i strongly recommend you make a copy or transfer it over to DVD then that way you have a backup.
I’ve heard that putting mouldy tapes into a vcr player can damage them..the mould will collect on the video heads and over time will break it..and if there’s mould on the video heads and you put a clean tape in, it can transfer onto that tape and make that mouldy too 😮
why don't you just wrap some micro fibre cloth around the first post then you wouldn't have to hold it away from the post? also i'm wondering if you could use a UV light to kill the mould or would that effect the tape ?
@@maxsol84 get some kimwipes and 90+% rubbing alcohol and spin it around while you gently hold the moistened wipe against the head. Look up how to clean dat recorders - same thing
Also, some mold has apparently been spreading through my vcr, because it has been smelling since i've put a moldy vhs tape in there, and now after two months it doesn't even give a picture anymore.
Unfortunately, my family tapes have become moldy. I will try one that I have already converted to DVD and see if I can tell the difference. Thanks for posting.
Why use several q tips to make tool? I would use a (handle end) of a teaspoon or similar to wrap the microcloth onto? Better flat surface? Or do you want the tool to flex? Good video nonetheless.
Unfortunately the mold will come back. Some of the tapes I've cleaned about a year ago got moldy again. My advice is to have a separate vcr just for your moldy tapes, both for cleaning and viewing, so that you wont contaminate mold-free tapes.
Also works on old recorder tapes...be careful, not all tapes can handle isopropal alcohol...one of the oldest of the recorder tapes had the outer layer stripped...
Can you clean a tape and still use the same VCR to watch tapes on? Assuming you do a good clean and if it's maybe a light cleaning job to begin with? I only have the one atm
We have some family tapes that are molded. Some don’t spin when you hit play, basically won’t move. Is that the mold? And why about tapes that you can what they audio but see no video? We weee gonna send these off to a company to restore but it’s very expensive and don’t know which tapes have stuff we want and stuff we don’t. So if I could do this myself that would be amazing! I’m pretty tech savvy, but never done anything like this. I wonder if some of the tapes needs to be restored completely to be able to be played. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Would you clean a second time to improve? Or would that be risky? TY BTW: I'm so klutzy, notsure I could do this. I have a couple of vcr's, even one that takes VHS tape and records onto dvd. But I have pretty bad amount of mold. We'll see.
I am just asking out of curiosity, but you know how some VHS Tapes do that jitter to the Blue Screen if it's an older tape? Does this process fix that sort of thing?
Jody Wagner Yes... definetely. You will contaminate your vcr and all the tapes you put inside afterwards. You can ruin your heads too if mold gets in contact with them.
JMA I been doing one with lots of mold on them then Cleaning my vcr with rubbing alcohol and so far no mold has returned to the tapes I finished after watching them with the vcr I use to clean them 😁
So the thing with all these cleaning mold videos is not one single person plays the tape after lol so is it playable??? I I been digitizing all my vhs but I have one moldy one I would love to know if it will be able to copy after cleaning
I have some tapes with like one small spot of dust that's about or less than the size of this . some have a few small spots around. Some have one and i mean ONE speck of small hair. Is it mold or is it possible for dust to get inside and on the reel?
Does this also help with the playback issue? Whenever I watch the 1995 THX "Star Wars: A New Hope", the video flickers as if the frames were being shuffled in some places.
If it has moId. think it would work. It’s just tape. But you may not be able to remind and forward it like he did on a machine. . You could use a biro pen to turn the reel and a cotton bud on the tape. Cleaning the inside of the tape holder would probably be more fiddley if you had to do that
Would a method like this work on a VHS rewinder/fast forwarder with just the spools attached? It seems that there would be enough space for cleaning in a case like that, but I'm not entirely sure.
ud have to modify it, thats what i was thinking of. Cause it wont rewind unless you drop the tape it and close it, then u might have to drill into the plastic housing to have a entrance area to sitck in a cleaner cloth or whatever you plant to use.
I had baby tapes found in the Attic some of them were moldy some of them are not the ones that were not moldy played fine I feel okay knowing that the other ones that were okay played fine so The moldy one should be okay?
That tape must have been stored in a very inhospitable place In a dark moist and hot place without any ventilation Keep your tapes properly stored people If you don't want to lose them
MR VHS COLLECTOR. Where did your cousin store the tapes? I wonder why there are so many moldy tapes out there? I keep mine in the house in a room and they all play perfectly.
Usually when mould occurs on a videotape it usually starts at the top and bottom edges (in theory you can just run a mouldy tape through a spare VCR a few times and clean it out later). The mould would only affect the recording surface if the tape has very deep mould (i.e. it wasn't caught soon enough) or if the tape got damp (if that happens the tape could suffer from sticky shed syndrome and require baking before even considering cleaning). Whenever I do this job I will often repeat the process until the cleaning tool is clean and there is no gunk on it (in a lot of cases if I need to do another clean on the rewind pass I have 2 cleaning tools, one for the bottom side before it hits the head and another for the top side after the head before the tape re-enters the cassette). In between passes I would recommend a break for the tape so the IPA can dry and any mould left can deactivate, in some extreme cases I will manually go through the tape (also leave the tape for a few days to see if any mould returns before considering running it through a good machine). This cleaning method uses the same principle as an RTI Tapechek machine and the cleaning tool does touch the whole surface area so it could knock pretty much all the mould off. Also don't use a good VCR for this job, always use a machine you don't mind losing, hell the heads can already be damaged, all it needs to do is fast forward, rewind and eject. Also afterwards I would recommend cleaning out the spare machine well.
2 additional thoughts. Buy a VCR for $10 at a resale shop for this, don't use your good one. Also this is not a permanent solution, this makes the tape usable so it can be copied to a clean new tape. The video will be preserved on the new tape.
I think its best to use an old VCR and also clean the heads on that too after. A panasonic engineer gave me a trip to clean heads on VCR. It was to use white paper. Tear off a little and spray Isopropyl on the paper and hold agains the silver drum that contains the heads and apply a little pressure as you turn the drum manually back and fore. (I always disconnect the VCR from the power supply while doing this ) You will see black on the paper, throw away and repeat the process till the paper does not pick up any dirt. Make sure you clean the full 360degrees of the drum.
After the drum head (relative to tape flow, be it FF/RW) is always better. Why? Because wet tape sticks, and if it is wet enough when it hits the drum, it's going to stick and bind everything up. I'd much rather have to clean a post than untangle that mess, especially as the name of this game is preservation.
