An almighty POP!

[CJSF]

Sitting listening to Chris Rea's album 'Dancing with Strangers' an almighty pop!!! came from the speakers. Investigation revealed a 'large', large by dust standards, sticky blob on the record, took some removing too. The consequences could have been serious, damaging the record and/or removing the tip!

Most of my records are 70's, 80's purchased, altough I came across a Sid Laurence album the other day that had a sticker on it for 49/11d, pre 1969, I actualy remember buying it, £2.50 was a lot of money then, my first new record purchase after my wedding in 1968. Records amd radio for 5 years befor we got a TV . . . *acute*

Back to the point, that pop could have been expensive, my old records need a deep cleen? Around £2.50 a go, what would a record cleaning machine cost . . . £500, DIY version save a few quid, I do have the makings of a home made jobbie in the shed, an abandoned project when it became obvious finished size would be impractical.

Ebay came up with a German offering; 'Satish Nokki RCM Mk2 Record cleaning machine', looks very much like a ;Moth type' but at £357 iclusive bundle with shipping. Any one come across this German machine, or know anything about it . . . or have any other sugestions?

The idea, clean 150 of my records and I'm in the black. Anything else is a bonus, might even find a group who would be regulars for a few cleans?

CJSF

 

[The_Lhc]

£2.50 a go? That sounds a lot, it's normally nearer a pound I've found, however I have been considering such a machine myself, so I'd be interested to hear any answers.

 

[chebby]

£2.50 a go? That sounds a lot, it's normally nearer a pound I've found, however I have been considering such a machine myself, so I'd be interested to hear any answers.

The service I used to use ...

http://www.vinylrecords.co.uk/Cleaning.html

(Although I didn't pay postage but just walked there as they are local )

And yes, it was worth it. I had every LP I bought from them cleaned before playing it (i'd even take brand-new vinyl to the shop and have it cleaned).

The washing and the new sleeve eliminated static and I barely had to clean a stylus again afterwards. Needless to say the pops and clicks were virtally eliminated too. (Although I used to select my s/h vinyl very carefully so they weren't a big problem.)

They bought a twin deck KM machine from the old 'Capital Radio' and got Keith Monks' guys in (from the Isle Of Wight) to refurbish and periodically replenish it.

It's almost unbelievable what it can do for a record (even one that doesn't look dirty). The dullest looking vinyl comes out looking blacker and glossier and refracting those bright yellows and blues in sunlight. (The really dirty ones don't reflect/refract anything much more than a greyish brown 'yech' colour before cleaning.)

 

[MrTeroo]

Go on......... make one!

http://www.whathifi.com/forum/turntables-and-lps/heath-robinson-rcm

*biggrin*

 

[thescarletpronster]

You could try the Knosti Disco-Antitstat - a manual machine which rotates the discs in a bath rather than on a platter, and drip-dry them rather than having a vacuum. But on the plus side it only costs £40, so a tenth or less than the alternatives. You can get excellent results too. There's a thread somewhere about this machine. Oh, here it is - still in my history.

If I was as handy as Mr Teroo I'd make a machine like his, which looks very impressive, but I have trouble gluing one thing to another (unless it's another thing that the first thing isn't supposed to be glued to, then I'm very good at it), so I'll stick with what I've got!

I've even had records which always skipped or repeated come up perfectly, and one record I bought second-hand which looked like it had been smeared in jab and then rubbed over a very hairy cat came up NM. With a bit of practice you can give most records a new lease of life.

 

[CJSF]

A bit more reserch, I have found a guy with a Keith Monks record cleaning mc who does not live to far away from me, £2 a go inc., new anti static sleeve. Result or what, he is a private individual, more woried about the quality of the finished job than making money.

I'm going to put 20 records together, pop down to see him next week. I have a whole load more to go after that!!!

CJSF

 

[brownz]

I picked one of these up 2nd hand and have been well chuffed with its performance over the years.

http://www.henleydesigns.co.uk/SpinClean-System-p815

 

[CJSF]

A bit more reserch, I have found a guy with a Keith Monks record cleaning mc who does not live to far away from me, £2 a go inc., new anti static sleeve. Result or what, he is a private individual, more woried about the quality of the finished job than making money.

I'm going to put 20 records together, pop down to see him next week. I have a whole load more to go after that!!!

CJSF

Got my first batch of 20 LP's back yesterday, well impressed by my initial listening, most of the records are 30+ years old and well played, surface noise has been dramaticaly reduced. Still got the od pop and tick, but you cant make a silk purse from a sows ear if its there, its there. A fair price for a good job, plus I got a cup of tea when I picked up. Andy is a nice guy, knows his hifi and is interested in 'music' for its own sake.

So another 30 albums were left for treatment, going to have a good listen this afternoon, have a few tweak adjustment ideas as well . . . once a tweaker always a tweaker*biggrin*

CJSF

 

[stevebrock]

Tweak away !

 

[EekOZ]

I did a DIY job and made one of these using PVC pipe and velvet:

Attach it to the hose of a wet/dry vac, wet clean records and just vacuum it all up. For a platter I just picked up an old broken turntable, stripped out all the insides so that I'm left with only the shell and platter with spindle, that I use to rotate the record when cleaning. Then I just picked up one of these antiskid floor protectors from our local hardware store that I use as a label protector:

Just made a hole in the middle so I can slip it over the spindle. Covers the label perfectly and the rubber gives grip to easily turn the platter while cleaning the record. Simple, cheap and really effective.