How To Clean A Noisy Record

[Guest Garry Huxley]

Maybe been done before, But how do you clean your old dirty worn out records ??

 

I Use a 50/50 mix of isopropanol/distilled or de-ionised water and swear by it, When used with a non linting soft cloth.

Oh yeah make sure there is no dye in the cloth.

 

What's your thought??

 

Garry Huxley.

 

P.S =  Was an aircraft engineer who introduced me to this method as it cleans plastics/vinyl prior to gluing on aircrafts etc.

And cheap as chips to boot

Edited April 12, 2013 by Garry Huxley

[tosspot]

wow now thats what i call good knowledge

[Guest Garry Huxley]

wow now thats what i call good knowledge

Hello to the tosspots, It realy does work iwas about to throw away some nice records when introduced to this method, Just apply sparingly to the cloth and wipe in a clockwise motion an will remove most of that horrible noise / dirt /static / etc.

do not go anti clockwise as it dosent work as well.

Garry

[Guest Garry Huxley]

!t's the alcohol that lifts the in grained dirt and the super clean water that disperses the static.

 

I bought a M- record a couple weeks ago and it was noisy, this made it sound WOW not the dealers fault as was visual inspection only.

 

Garry

[Pk 22dj]

Where would you buy this from exactly.

Thanks PK

[Middleman]

Where would you buy this from exactly.

Thanks PK

Amazon have some

[Guest Garry Huxley]

Where would you buy this from exactly.

Thanks PK

 

It would cost you about £10 from a chemist shop for about 500ml and a lengthy explanition what you wanted it for as it is wood alcohol and would fry your brain if drunk,

However if you found a cleaning chemical company near to you it would be about £3 a litre which would last about 5 years, With my meagre collection ive used 1ltr in 10 yrs.

 

It's like the bootleg vodka that we are warned about

[Guest Garry Huxley]

Amazon have some

How much are they selling it for ?

[Middleman]

How much are they selling it for ?

£10.80 for a litre, theres a few sizes and they are sold by shiny hardware through amazon, to tell the truth I didn't have a clue what the stuff was so I googled it and the first "result" was amazon

Cheers

[Guest Garry Huxley]

£10.80 for a litre, theres a few sizes and they are sold by shiny hardware through amazon, to tell the truth I didn't have a clue what the stuff was so I googled it and the first "result" was amazon

Cheers

 

Ouch Point made ROBBIN illigitimates

[Geeselad]

1/3 mould and mildew remover, 1/3 glass cleaner, 1/3 water has worked reasonably well for me, I know the guys at vinyl exchange in manchester use a similar mix to above.

[boba]

just a note:

 

vodka contains ethyl alcohol (ethanol)

wood alcohol is methyl alcohol (methanol)

neither of these things are ispropyl alcohol.

 

none of the three are equivalent in cleaning records. so you have to be specific.

Edited April 13, 2013 by boba

[DerekG]

If you are in a position to 'aquire' them the swabs used to clean skin before an injection are 70% isopropyl alcohol already soaked into a lint free cloth,.

A single wipe will clean 2-3 records before it evaporates, if folded in2 it just covers both sides of vinyl without touching label.

Almost as if they were made for cleaning singles

 

[NEV]

I tend to clean the more shabby 45's that arrive in the hope they will sound better .

I play test em before so I can monitor any improvement ,but on one occasion ,having cleaned a rather dull looking 45 ,to my horror ,the record that played thru ok and didn't sound too bad ,had suddenly developed a jump !

Maybe that ground in dirt had filled a very small dink caused by a careless needle drop and I unwittingly cleared the hole

My advice is play test your records and as the old saying goes " if it ain't broke ,don't mend it !

P.s

Anyone got any tips on a good solution for filling that dink back in please ??

[Guest]

furniture polish is good I use it with an old stylus on full weight you would not belive the amount of crap that comes out of the grooves then i use isopropyl alcohol to finish off

[boba]

i told you i can fix skips

[boba]

furniture polish is good I use it with an old stylus on full weight you would not belive the amount of crap that comes out of the grooves then i use isopropyl alcohol to finish off

 

I hope you disclose this when selling because the vinyl is visibly polished / buffed in this case

[NEV]

i told you i can fix skips

Yes but you never told me how

I've tried that wet and dry sandpaper stuff but that just made it worse ...

However ,the belt sander did give the vinyl a nice smooth playing surface

[Guest]

I hope you disclose this when selling because the vinyl is visibly polished / buffed in this case

 

 

Why should  I disclose this there records for my own collection besides I've done it for years and its never done anyharm to them

[DerekG]

just a note:

 

vodka contains ethyl alcohol (ethanol)

wood alcohol is methyl alcohol (methanol)

neither of these things are ispropyl alcohol.

 

none of the three are equivalent in cleaning records. so you have to be specific.

 

Straight from Wikipaedia

 

CH₃OH

Methanol

Wood alcohol

C₂H₅OH

Ethanol

Grain alcohol

C₃H₇OH

Isopropyl alcohol

Rubbing alcohol

C₄H₉OH

Butyl alcohol

Butanol

C₅H₁₁OH

Pentanol

Amyl alcohol

C₁₆H₃₃OH

Hexadecan-1-ol

Cetyl alcohol

 

All will cause you harm if you consume them - Ethanol just takes longest and needs more.

 

Derek

[NEV]

Why should I disclose this there records for my own collection besides I've done it for years and its never done anyharm to them

IMHO ,nobody ever does what you said you do ..

Purely on the basis I have never seen a single 45 in sales that stated so ?

VPI cleaned often seen on eBay sellers descriptions but nothing on here in sales ?

Take no notice of Bob ,he's from Chicago,which does'nt mean he's a bad person ,just has a different molecular structure than the more refined and reserved UK model

[Guest]

I have always found the furniture polish really does do the trick especially on old ska records that have been abused to hell would love to buy a record cleaning machine one day but there so expensive

[Mark Jones]

Isopropyl alcohol is the liquid you get if you buy CD cleaner disc from the pound shop.

I use it daily at BT when working with optical fibre to clean off the dirt before splicing fibres together and cleaning optical connectors etc.

 

Another fav vinyl/styrene cleaner is WD40 as mentioned here many times!

[Guest]

you can get Isopropyl alcohol from your local chemist in a 600ml bottle last one i bought was about 4.50

[boba]

Yes but you never told me how

I've tried that wet and dry sandpaper stuff but that just made it worse ...

However ,the belt sander did give the vinyl a nice smooth playing surface

 

I've cleaned tens of thousands of records and spent hundreds of hours figuring out how to do things. I even offered to fix a skip for free for you. I'm not teaching you how to fish and even if I did you would ruin lots of records learning to do it correctly.

 

If someone uses furniture polish or WD40, whether or not you think it doesn't do anything negative, I would like to know at your sale. Thank you.

[boba]

and just to be clear, polished / buffed records and wd-40ed records are easy to spot, even if the person applying them doesn't know the difference.

[Guest Garry Huxley]

I have always found the furniture polish really does do the trick especially on old ska records that have been abused to hell would love to buy a record cleaning machine one day but there so expensive

 

I bought a record from Hemel market about 15 yrs ago, on playing it was slipping on the turntable mat and lots of small lumps were appearing on the record.

On closer inspection it turned out to be black shoe polish, A friend said it was used to fix a skip, A few wipes later it played ok but i wish the dealer had been honest with me

[boba]

black shoe polish isn't as bad of a buffing agent, although it sucks and is difficult to get off. wd-40 and furniture polish are much more irreversible. if i get a polished record i'm sending it back.

[Guest]

When you say polishing do you mean buffing the record to make it shiny

[Guest]

I use the furniture polish because it removes alot of the grime from the grooves also its anti static too If you have evidence that it harms records I would love to see it

[Tiberius]

furniture polish is good I use it with an old stylus on full weight you would not belive the amount of crap that comes out of the grooves then i use isopropyl alcohol to finish off

Could it be that the crap you're dragging out of the grooves is the furniture polish you just applied?

 

 Whatever work for you has got to be fine but, to my way of thinking at least, if you apply polish to a dirty record you just have a shiny dirty record.

[boba]

when you clean a record in such a way that it removes the dirt without physically affecting the vinyl it reveals the natural gloss of whatever non-scuffed part of the vinyl / styrene is left. when you clean a record in such a way that it actually "polishes" the vinyl, effectively skimming it or taking off part of a layer, it has an unnatural shine that masks the real playing condition. One of my pet peeves is polished records. Other people might not mind. But it is purely aesthetic and doesn't improve play past cleaning the dirt. The improvement in play you do get from the furniture polish is from the part where it does actually clean some of the dirt.

 

WD-40 permanently embeds itself in the grooves and binds to them and creates an unnatural shine that's totally visible. If you take a mint record and spray WD-40 on it, it doesn't look the same as before, does it? Any cleaning method should be applicable to a mint record and leave it looking and playing exactly the same as if you didn't clean it.

[Guest]

Could it be that the crap you're dragging out of the grooves is the furniture polish you just applied?

 

 Whatever work for you has got to be fine but, to my way of thinking at least, if you apply polish to a dirty record you just have a shiny dirty record.

 

 

Well I have played them before cleaning and after and they have always sounded better after cleaning

[Guest Garry Huxley]

I Must also state that i never clean a record that plays well, If it's not broke, dont fix it

[Tiberius]

Well I have played them before cleaning and after and they have always sounded better after cleaning

You said in your earlier post you use Isopropyl alchohol after applying polish and playing the record.  This is most likely what's getting into the grooves to do the actual cleaning not the polish.  Applying polish, which are normally either wax or silicon based, is just adding a glossy layer to the surface of the vinyl.  In the worst case scenario if this is too thick, ie wax based, it will just fill the grooves, which your needle will proceed to plough through and pick up. 

 

Purely from a time/cost/cosmetic aspect I don't see the point of 1st spraying on a glossy finish only to remove it straight after with isopropyl alcohol.  As I said earlier.....whatever works for you.

[NEV]

I've cleaned tens of thousands of records and spent hundreds of hours figuring out how to do things. I even offered to fix a skip for free for you. I'm not teaching you how to fish and even if I did you would ruin lots of records learning to do it correctly.

If someone uses furniture polish or WD40, whether or not you think it doesn't do anything negative, I would like to know at your sale. Thank you.

Bob ,I'll have you know I am a skilled tradesman and very good with my hands !

I have been building houses for neatly 30 yr my good friend and believe me when I say ,the things I can do with a trowel is no mans business !

The trowel and his little brother ,the pointing trowel ,are very intricate tools and in the wrong hands ,very dangerous ..but in the right hands ( mine ) ,have been known to perform open heart surgery on a very ill work colleague !

So I am 99% certain ,with a guide in the right direction I should be able to master repairing a tiny dink or scratch ??

Self levelling compound might be a good place to start with for the dink ,then amagnifying glass a sharp craft knife and a steady hand should sort the scratch out

However I think selling a record that has been repaired should obviously be mentioned in a sale ??

P.s

Off topic but I've just been reminded ..I played the fish song last night at a venue ..and the response was great .People up off their seats dancing to a newbie ..amazing sight !

[Guest]

right off out to play in the sunshine its a lovely day

[stokesoulboy]

WOOD GLUE !! LOL Ask Sean Chapman and Nige Brown !! 

[night nurse]

WOOD GLUE !! LOL Ask Sean Chapman and Nige Brown !! 

well thats one done 500 more to do lol