Vinyl Cleaning & Care

The best cleaning liquid is Isopropyl Alcohol or Ethanol diluted at 40:80 ratio with Distilled water. Add a few drops of some kind of surfactant so that this liquid, when applied to vinyl, reaches the bottom of the groove. Your US imported liquid is most probably this cocktail. For cleaning, dab a few drops and then wipe with Velvet. Apply linear outward motion from the centre of the LP.

For best result, you need to vacuum the disk. I have a DIY LP disk cleaner using an old direct drive TT and a defunct domestic vacuum cleaner. After applying the aforementioned liquid, I vacuum the disk to scoop out all the grunge. If required I can post a few pics which can explain the contraption. It’s quite simple actually.

soulforged schrieb:

I tried cleaning a couple of records by placing them under gently running water and playing it for a short while with a thin film of water to remove static. Is this a good way of cleaning?

The LP’s so cleaned are screwed forever. Have you heard them how they are sounding when dry? Water is only good if its has been double filtered DW. Tap water is bad news for LP’s

screamgigi schrieb:

The LP’s so cleaned are screwed forever. Have you heard them how they are sounding when dry? Water is only good if its has been double filtered DW. Tap water is bad news for LP’s

Phew! Thankfully they were just a few LPs and I used distilled water. That seemed to have cleaned the surface and the crackle and pop were reduced a bit when played dry...but I guess I'd better get a cleaning solution fast...can't really see myself concocting your recipe...but where can I get the ingredients? at a hardware store?

Thanks for the response

Would love to see the pics of your record cleaner.

soulforged,

the ingredients you need are
(1) distilled water. A chemist can provide this in India or a shop providing Chemistry supplies to a school/college.
(2) 90% or better isopropyl alcohol. Again a chemist shop can provide this.
(3) a surfactant like Photoflow or Triton-X. this can be obtained from a camera shop that sells supplies for people who develop their own negatives.

I mix these in an 80:20 water:alcohol proportion (screamgigi suggested 80:40. everyone has their own favourite receipe!) & add 2 drops of the surfactant. Shake well during making. Before each use shake well.

Best if you can make a DIY vacuum or buy one. Cadence (the speaker company based in Poona) makes an Oki-Noki vacuum cleaner. It might not be cost-effective but it's an answer if you are not a DIY person.
Not having a vinyl vacuum cleaner => the dirt is being moved from one point on the LP to another in circles along the grooves. It's tough & tedious to remove the dirt effectively w/o a vacuum cleaner but it can be done.
FWIW.

I actually prefer 60:40 IPA with DW. Ideally you should a ‘Strong’, ‘Regular’ and ‘Lite’ mix and depending upon the condition of the LP select the best.

A few drops of surfactant will help in reducing the surface tension of water molecules, so that they can breakdown and saturate even the microscopic areas of the groove. Makes a major difference. Kodak Fotoflow is excellent. You can perhaps beg a photo guy for a few ml’s. Should last you several years. A full bottle could be expensive for the purpose.

This is a link to a DIY vacuum cleaner. I made something similar.
http://www.teresaudio.com/haven/cleaner/cleaner.html

Thanks Bombaywalla and Screamgigi!

Not much of a DIY person but I think I'll give the cleaning soln. a shot rather than get the expensive one...

Couple more questions:
Should I get a record cleaning brush (wet/dry)? I typically use a high quality soft cloth sourced from my optician for wet cleaning. Also, can I use a soft make-up brush for dry cleaning?

soulforged,

make sure that the "high quality" soft cloth from your optician is lint-free. I, too, have several of these cloths for cleaning my eye-glasses. They are very good for dry cleaning but the moment they get wet, the cloth basically stops working. I know this 'cuz if there is a drop of water on my glasses & I clean it w/ this soft cloth, it leaves delicate strands of cloth on the lens. It's easy to see these strands if I put the glasses up against the sunlight.
These delicate strands will find their way into the LP groove & eventually onto the stylus. Not good!
I, personally, would recommend a LP cleaning brush which has a good grip so that you can give the LP a good scrubbing by applying moderate hand pressure.

For dry cleaning, I prefer to use a carbon-fiber brush 'cuz it is anti-static. Using a vacuum cleaner on the LP, sometimes, puts static charge on the LP. A carbon-fiber brush is a great way to remove this static charge + to brush away any obvious strands of cloth, etc that might be on the LP surface. Also, this brush is the width of the playing surface of the LP so w/ 1 or 2 revolutions of the LP one can swipe the LP clean. I doubt that the make-up brush is wide enough, which might encourage the dust to jump from one location to another.
the other thing I like about the carbon-fiber brush is that the bristles have zero tension in them when they bend. AFAIK, a make-up brush fibers have tension in them when bent. That could dislodge dust from the LP & make it fly onto another part of the LP w/o your knowing as the bristles straighten out.
Atleast here Philips make a carbon-fiber brush for $10. I know, Rs 450 in India. Maybe Cadence (Poona) sell one w/ their vacuum cleaner as a package deal?

screamgigi: I like Teres turntables. Visually very appealing + I've always read that they sound very good too. Unique combination for audio (lol!).
FWIW.

I would like to bring your attention to surfactants. Some say that Kodak Photoflow is not good because it comtains other substances that can harm Vinyl(the plasticisers used are removed) and stylus.

I have used Godrej Ezee fabric cleaner as surfactant as a precaution always rinse the disk using 10% isopropyl water mixture so that any residue left behind by the surfactant is removed.

Note. Now Godrej Ezee is comig with a fabric softner which I have not tried and most probably will leave residue. Same is the case with Teepol available nowadays, some yrs back we used to get industrial grade Teepol (B300) from Shell and it worked fine both as wetting agent and at higher dosage as cleaning solution for the kitchen sink LP cleaning system:)

ani schrieb:

I would like to bring your attention to surfactants. Some say that Kodak Photoflow is not good because it comtains other substances that can harm Vinyl(the plasticisers used are removed) and stylus.

this topic has been debated at length on another forum where I'm a member. The consesus was that, FOR THE TIME FOTOFLOW REMAINS ON THE LP DURING CLEANING, the damage done (in removing the placitizers) is next to negligible. There were several people who posted their experience using Fotoflow-based cleaning solutions for years & years w/ NO damage to their LPs.
One thing to note in their experiences was that, as "ani" suggested, they ALL rinsed the LPs with distilled water post Fotoflow cleaning.
So, yes, I would also recommend that "soulforged" rinse his LPs w/ distilled water after cleaning w/ Fotoflow. In fact, in every LP cleaning regimen that I've read about a final rinse w/ distilled water has been strongly urged.