No bass with new turntable?

Wetfeet, as for taking cleaning a step further, I am rather unstable on the subject. I do a minimum of 15 minutes of ultrasound followed by 3 rinses of purified water plus one of distilled water. The results are obvious: water beads and streams off the records, like a newly waxed fender.

After 400 hours, I inspected my premium cartridge with a lab microscope, and could find no trace of wear. Nor could my dealer. That means that the ultrasound more than paid for itself in cartridge life, and the better sound is just a bonus.

I suggest that you go slow and improve things one step at a time. A record cleaning machine is a good investment, but buy it used - there is nothing much to go wrong. By the way, it is good to clean all records, even if they are new and sealed. Otherwise you risk a trace of oil in the grooves, which combines with dust, and forms a grinding compound which reshapes your stylus, and thence your wallet.

Holy moly terry9, to the non-audiophile that might sound borderline whacky! That's quite a cleaning process, but I understand. It's all part of the fun, almost ceremonial process of vinyl listening. I have a nice little collection of tobacco pipes and enjoy the process of smoking occasionally, and often relate listening to vinyl and smoking a pipe. I felt lazy about using my new Spin Clean, but I feel embarrassed now after hearing your process. You don't have one of those Nitty Gritty units do you? I imagine your cleaning gear is worth more than my entire TT set up.

I also noticed in another post you mentioned Bryston, do you have one? 

Terry9, I don't know why one should fear "oil" would be a problem with new LPs, but if it ever were a problem, one would be best off to use a solvent that can have a hope of solubilizing oily compounds, which would involve using a mild detergent, either ionic or non-ionic. Ultrasound and either "pure" or "distilled" water (you used these terms; I don't know how you distinguish between them) might not solubilize oily petroleum derivatives.  There is a prevailing belief that new LPs are plagued by "mold release" compounds; this idea has been recently dispelled; there's no such thing, according to one authority.

Hello Wetfeet.

Yes, as I mentioned, a bit unstable on the subject. I use a commercial US unit from Germany, Elmasonic, with a motor driven contraption above the tank to turn the records. I get best results cleaning two records at a time, which give the US waves plenty of room to develop fully, and also, allows about 80 W per record for cleaning.

I also use a lab grade detergent in the cleaning solution, specially formulated for plastics (so says the blurb), known as Versaclean, at the lower end of the recommended range (40:1). As you point out, Lew, pure water would not dissolve oil, and one would expect any oil removed by US cavitation to re-adhere to the vinyl surface.

Lew, I have read both: that mold release compound was (is?) used by some manufacturers but not others, and also that any residual oil is the product of the pressing process. I have no expert opinion on the matter, but I am playing it safe. Anyway, it's easier to plunge a new record into a standard solution - with 4 rinses, (3 with purified water (2 rinses under running water, one immersion), by 'purified' I mean the best tap water on the continent run through a grit filter and then a charcoal filter, and one rinse with distilled water), there are probably 0 molecules of detergent on the vinyl surface - comparable to the final plunge in distilled water.

I saw an analysis of the grunge in record grooves, and what caught my eye was something like 30% diamond dust!!!!! Now, where could that have come from? And what did it do to the next stylus?? AGHH???

Hence ultrasound. YMMD

Wetfeet, I forgot to respond to your question about Bryston.

I am using home-brew Class A electronics now, which is a big step up from Bryston, but I still remember both the 3B-SST and 4B-SST fondly. Bulletproof doesn't begin to say it. I accidentally shorted out the 4B by touching the speaker terminals to an aluminum chassis, basically using the machine as an arc-welder. Naturally, the 4B shut right down. I thought, "I can't expect Bryston to pay for this much foolishness," but thought that I might as well listen before I packed it up for factory service.

I waited half an hour for it to cool right down, then fired it up. Perfect. Unchanged. Wow.

Also, before I bought them, I talked to the factory. They put me through to some guy, highly expert, who took an hour to talk audio with me. Turned out, he was the president. Some company.