advertisement


Cleaning Vinyl With "Into The Groove Cleaner" and Cloths?

Moppit said:
Hi Pete,
I thought tap water was a no-no unless you have particularly soft water? I regularly rinse my black car with tap water after washing and the result is horrid. There is normally a grubby film that needs lots of work to remove. To think I've chucked that on my LP's would be a worry....

You might as well use tap water with the IPA if you have a clean supply?
Click to expand...

In the Midlands the water isn't hard and the amount that gets left on to evaporate is negligible so it's not a problem depending on how OCD you are:D

Pete
 
Does everyone clean their records? I never have, apart from with a carbon fibre brush just before playing them. Never had any trouble with surface noise unless the pressing was bad.
 
Seanm said:
Does everyone clean their records? I never have, apart from with a carbon fibre brush just before playing them. Never had any trouble with surface noise unless the pressing was bad.
Click to expand...

Apart from a Dust Bug and pad of some sorts, I don't remember suffering unduly from clicks, pops and crackles in my earlier days of vinyl. Also, with Shure m.m. cart's, I was obviously playing at a much lighter v.t.f. than in the last few decades. Memory dims any pain at the time, though as I transferred most things to Revox and/or cassette, record noise would have been annoying.

However, when your cart costs relative peanuts and an interchangeable stylus is available, crud build-up isn't so important. With multi-thousand pound m.coils on fixed head-shells with fine tolerance stylus profiles, it's a completely different story.
 
theparallaxview said:
Useful page here on cleaning and making the right fluid. https://londonjazzcollector.wordpress.com/for-audiophiles/home-brew-cleaner-for-vacuum-rcms/
Click to expand...


Good reading; it actually mentions using freezer water for your distilled/purified water, which is what I use, thrice filtered, just to be sure. My IPA to water mix is 1:3 normally, but I have upped that a bit for recalcitrant records. Obviously 99.????% IPA.

Re. wetting agent, I use unperfumed quality washing up liquid, as I (and others) found it difficult/impossible to but photographic wetting agent in manageable quantities, if at all! However, if you can get it, it's probably better.

I've been using this mix for my VPI for at least 5 years and 1500 records. Interesting to note the comment that natural air drying of records is, in fact, counter-productive. Pretty obvious, really, but unfortunately that only leaves a vacuum extraction machine, which is (unless you buy cheaply/sell easily) not really cost-effective for 50 to 100 records or so.
 
I've had a disco antistat thingy for around 10 years and never used it. I finally got around to making my own fluid mix and trying it out a few weeks back - cleaned around 20 albums so far.

I'm sure it's not as good as a proper RCM - but it's also better than doing nothing. I did find the first batch of 5 I did caused the stylus to need regular cleaning, I guess because I just moved crud around and down into the grooves. I now wet the record and leave it for 5 mins in the bath before cleaning again, and spinning as fast as I can after to get rid of as much liquid as possible. Things were much better.

For my last batch I also used a clean microfibre cloth to clean record once dry.

I use coffee filter bags to filter the cleaning fluid after - I chucked my first batch after the stock filter failed to remove most of the dirt.

Richard
 
I'm sure there are plenty of threads on RCM's, if not here then on the Linn forum. I don't recall anyone complaining about the Okki Nokki, but it was because I couldn't afford one that I built the Moth kit (they do a fully built one too at a reasonable price). The Moth is good if a bit 'manual' to use, and don't forget the ear defenders when using it.

Having a RCM means you can try all of the cheap LP's from the charity shops with a surprisingly high success rate (sadly not so cheap any more though).
 
forester said:
I couldn't afford a proper RCM either and must have mentioned this to my wife. Sometime later I received the Moth RCM kit as a gift. it's basically all of the mechanical and electrical components together with plans and instructions on making up the cabinet and building the machine. It works out at half the price of a fully built machine. Most of the work is in the cabinet (the blockboard to build it costs about £25), and was a bit time consuming but I now have an excellent machine which has done over 5 years service so far and should last a lifetime.

The only realistic alternative in my opinion is to pay per disk to use one at a shop or through mail order.

There is also the rather controversial wood glue technique............
Click to expand...

I also built one from a kit, and to make it quieter I decided to use 15mm Contiboard instead of the 12mm specified in the plans. I does appear to make it quieter but it got very tricky to make sure I'd allowed for the extra thickness when constructing the enclosure! I reckon the Moth and probably the Okki-Nokki) are just as effective at cleaning records than the most expensive RCMs. You soak the surface with suitable fluid, leave it to soak for a bit, then vacuum it off, taking all the crud away & leaving a bone-dry surface.

I really don't think alternative methods to the RCM are very good, and you stand the risk of pushing gunk into the grooves as others have pointed out. I spent ages going through my LP collection, getting rid of the pops & crackles caused by using various fluid and wipe systems in the past.

If you can't justify buying an RCM, maybe you can hire one from your hi-fi dealer - mine lends a Moth out for a very small charge. If you clean your records once, put them into a new inner sleeve and don't leave them out when not playing them, you won't need to clean them again.
 
I agree with Tony, except in the implementation. I think the scrub (but soft scrub !!!!) both ways is important for (a) pushing the mix into the grooves, and (b) removing surface marks, fingerprints etc. before the soak. I do it afterwards as well, but I may be anal.

Also, depending on your mix (IPA or non alcohol) and the ambient temperature, the record should be left to thoroughly dry on the platter (1 to 3 minutes?) before sleeving, as no RCM/vacuum can actually DRY grooves.
 
I place mine on a coffee mug so the air can get to both sides and speed up the drying.

Pete
 
Pete MB&D said:
I place mine on a coffee mug so the air can get to both sides and speed up the drying.

Pete
Click to expand...

Sounds like grounds for a disaster.:D I assume you have an RCM which cleans both sides simultaneously; otherwise I can't see the point unless it's freeze-dried.:)
 
No, hand clean with foam and velvet, tap water rinse and blot dry.
No CDO here.

Pete
 
Dowser said:
I've had a disco antistat thingy for around 10 years and never used it. I finally got around to making my own fluid mix and trying it out a few weeks back - cleaned around 20 albums so far.

I'm sure it's not as good as a proper RCM - but it's also better than doing nothing. I did find the first batch of 5 I did caused the stylus to need regular cleaning, I guess because I just moved crud around and down into the grooves. I now wet the record and leave it for 5 mins in the bath before cleaning again, and spinning as fast as I can after to get rid of as much liquid as possible. Things were much better.

For my last batch I also used a clean microfibre cloth to clean record once dry.

I use coffee filter bags to filter the cleaning fluid after - I chucked my first batch after the stock filter failed to remove most of the dirt.

Richard
Click to expand...

I use a cheap plastic windowbox filled with distilled water for rinsing after the wash (keep the clamp on the record and spin it vertically in the water on it axis) and then leaving to dry. On the plus side, gunk on the stylus is practically non-existant. The downside is that the records take much longer to dry.
 
Minstrel, I washed a batch of s/h records using my Knosti Disco Antistat, with L'art Du Son liquid, laid the record on a kitchen towel placed onto a marble Lazy Susan from the kitchen then vacuumed the liquid off using a Karcher window vacuum, with a microfibre cloth over the nozzle. I rotated the discs anti-clockwise in the Knosti, and left them to dry any residual moisture on the Knosti stand, which was only around 30 minutes or so.
Seems to have worked ok, but have to admit there's still some light noise, but that may be due to ingrained dust?
I tried manually using my Vax wet-and-dry vacuum, bought years ago for carpet cleaning, but found it difficult to regulate the airflow, and found it far too fierce, and as the Karcher seems to work ok, I'm sticking with that.
My record collection is a small one, most of them haven't been played for years, and I've been buying new discs, but am now buying more used records, which will be cleaned, so I can't see the point of an RCM.
 
If you own and buy lots of used vinyl, a proper record cleaning machine is essential, whether you make or buy one. It is one of the best audio-related investments I've ever made. There's no substitute; all those wipes and 'wash under the tap and rinse off and dry' methods ain't even close!

I'm even thinking of buying one of those ultrasound cleaners but I'll wait for more alternatives and for the prices to come down.
 
Fudgemaster said:
...I tried manually using my Vax wet-and-dry vacuum, bought years ago for carpet cleaning, but found it difficult to regulate the airflow, and found it far too fierce...
Click to expand...

Me too but on the nozzle handle there is a sliding cover which when open reduces the suction very significantly - easy to regulate the airflow to get it just right.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top