Restoring old 1/4" reel to reel tape ?

Emp_Fab

I've got a couple of reel-to-reel tapes that were from my dad's old Telefunken deck that contain the only recordings I have of his voice, as well as me when I was a baby.  They're about fifty years old.  I bought a cheap reel-to-reel machine to play them and get them into my PC as digital recordings, but I haven't attempted it yet.

I have no idea of the state of the physical media as I haven't touched it yet - the tape might crumble in my fingers or it might be fine.

Would anyone have any tips on maximising my chances of getting the tapes to play without disintegrating (I only need them to play once) ?  Some kind of washing first or soaking in something ?  Or, just load them up as they are and go for it ?

equalsql

You normally have to bake them to drive out any moisture to prevent the oxide from delaminating.. I had some 30 year old 1/2 tapes I wanted to digitise, so I baked each tape for about 8 hours by putting them outside in a glass frame during the summer with an added lightbulb for extra heat.
This gave me a temp of 50-60c over the each 8 hour period.  When finished the tapes ran on an old TSR8 at 15fps without a hitch and no shedding of oxide. There was a wee bit of print-through on some of the vocal tracks but I was very pleased with the final captures.
Do not wash the tapes! 

You could you an electric fan oven set to 55c but avoid gas as it produces water vapour when it burns.