My experience with tapes does not match yours. I've seen both audio and VCR tapes unspool by playing or trying to remove them from the player.
My experience with tapes does not match yours. I've seen both audio and VCR tapes unspool by playing or trying to remove them from the player.
I estimate renting over 1200 VCR tapes in my lifetime, and I've never had one unspool. The cassette problem was common enough that fixing it with a pencil was part of the zeitgeist, but I can't remember anything like that for VHS.
i had ONE cassette unwind. my less careful friend was always winding them with a pencil. the culprit? button mashing between fast-forward and play.
I grew up in the 80s, and was a prolific user of both video tapes (mostly VHS) and cassette tapes. I can't recall ever having a tape get eaten by any deck, either video or audio.
Not saying it never happens, but if it was common I absolutely would have encountered it many times over.
> I can't recall ever having a tape get eaten by any deck ... if it was common I absolutely would have encountered it many times over.
Common enough that you know the slang for it, despite it not happening to you.
Touché
I think it happened more as the players aged and wore out. In the 90s and 2000s I remember it happening pretty commonly although cd or dvd skipping was way worse. A couple years ago we took the old family vcr player out of the parents attic and tested it out. It was a great vcr at the time, sony with all the bells and whistles. But it immediately at the tape and I mean ate it. Had to take it apart and route the tape out myself and I'm pretty sure its ruined the tape. We spent 2 hours on youtube with it taken apart and gave up the project indefinitely.
That must be an issue with the player