Studer C37 Valve reel to reel tape recorder

Posted by  in Thursday, February 11th 2010   
Topics: Pro Audio    
Seblington asked:


Built in 1960, told to be the best valve reel to reel ever made, it is said that Willi Studer saw one of the Ampex machines (probably an Ampex 300 or 350), he was so impressed with the recorder he set out to build a better machine. The C37 by far blows away the Ampex and any reel to reel of its time for build quality, though I have not had an Ampex 300 or 350 to listen to I could not personally say which really does sound better. The recorder was a stereo version of the famous J37 which was used in the beetles recordings, the C37 was the first stereo professional reel to reel to come from Studer and it also marks the co-operation with EMT Wilhelm Franz and Studer, the recorder boasts a recording frequency of 20Hz to 17khz +-2db on 7.1/2 or 15 ips, this one records 20khz on 15ips with +-2db though a world famous designer Tim de Paravicini can modify these machines to record 20Hz to 35lhz +-1db with a S/N of 90db! This is beyond CD quality as 90db noise is not detectable and cd's frequency output is 20khz (Half the digitized sample rate).

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24 Comments

fimballs said in February 13th, 2010 at 6:14 am    

ok thanks for replying.

Seblington said in February 14th, 2010 at 10:57 am    

Hello, sorry to say I dont have one of these, it went some time ago when I was trying to make the collection smaller.

fimballs said in February 15th, 2010 at 2:57 am    

just looking at your website and saw the countess machine is this on youtube? if not please do a demo .thanks for your fantastic vids bythe way.

toth1971 said in February 16th, 2010 at 4:25 pm    

thankyou erjohnson227 check my amp out.

erjohnson227 said in February 18th, 2010 at 3:06 am    

Amen to that brother.

btown2011 said in February 19th, 2010 at 1:28 am    

you live in us? or europe? i have tones of new and nos tubes.

marksmall82 said in February 20th, 2010 at 7:36 am    

i recently bought a grundig reel to reel off ebay and the tubes in it are black at the ends. do you think i could get replacements from anywhare?

ReelyReelyMe said in February 20th, 2010 at 5:16 pm    

Very Nice Machine! I love the analog sound…

btown2011 said in February 22nd, 2010 at 9:05 pm    

i was just wondering what oxide is used in tapes? black, brown, or red any difference.

cransley said in February 24th, 2010 at 2:57 pm    

ouch – sounds like a bearing is failing in the transport somewhere. Spooling should sound much smoother :-)

toth1971 said in February 25th, 2010 at 6:57 pm    

you just cant beat valves…

prosdocimirecording said in March 1st, 2010 at 5:39 am    

It’s a fantastic machine, I use it in my analogue recording studio as mastering machine and, everytime I listen to the mix I feel very very very very lucky!

charlessmyth said in March 1st, 2010 at 6:02 pm    

On my half inch 2 track, by Tim de Paravicini, running 30ips, you can peak at +12db, so don’t have to worry about noise. The original tubes are very rare, but can be replaced by more common types, after some modifications. Tape editing is usually done with an edit block and a razor blade, and XLRs are the I/O connections. It’s a good idea to change out the mains socket for an IEC three pin, which needs a qmax to punch the chassis. Definitely a two man lift, even without the trolley :-)

Seblington said in March 3rd, 2010 at 5:29 pm    

Yes, its all XLR and the valves can be brought from all sorts of places, RS sell them new (Most of the ones in this machine).

TVperson1 said in March 6th, 2010 at 8:34 pm    

So does this machine have XLR (or cannon) sockets on it?
Where do you get the valves from?

jwallis123 said in March 8th, 2010 at 10:46 pm    

the modularity is most interesting to me. nice video.

Mastercorder said in March 9th, 2010 at 4:17 am    

well designed well thought out …. built to last ………..

karen608608 said in March 9th, 2010 at 10:25 am    

a pair of scissors to cut the tape? my, how impressive!

andreasoberholz said in March 12th, 2010 at 2:35 pm    

Studer is Swiss and I guess this machine is expensive….but fantastic engineering I agree….

nuttierthanthou said in March 15th, 2010 at 3:12 am    

superb engineering

nvanzoeren said in March 17th, 2010 at 1:31 am    

its a true beauty!!!
Nice informative movie

oviwolf said in March 20th, 2010 at 12:04 pm    

whoooohoo!what a nice recorder!very mechanical….!and a complex video!

Seblington said in March 23rd, 2010 at 10:36 am    

Cheers! this recorder gets used almost every day, I am thinking of dismantling it and sending parts off to be sprayed and parts to be anodized, replace all the bearings and the caps, it sounds great apart from a little rumble from iffy cap’s.

Seblington said in March 23rd, 2010 at 12:11 pm    

This is one recorder I will never want to sell, I would love to get a second one, I also plan to restore the main deck once I have the correct jade hammertone.

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