Is this the solution to LP static issues?? Seems to be!

daveyf

What's a clean record? To some, it is one cleaned with, ahem, break fluid ...

It is odd that the one guy here who cleans LPs with brake fluid insists he doesn't need a record cleaner. Maybe he's right!

@cleeds Or, maybe’s he’s wrong! Or, maybe for his definition of clean and his expectation of what a ’clean’ LP sounds like, maybe that is good enough...and you are correct...maybe he’s right (for him)! I’m not buying it though.

Wow, cleeds, sir what planet are you living on. I don't know what you do but when I play a record it comes out of the sleeve directly onto the platter, the sweep arm is placed, the tonearm is cued and the dust cover goes right down. On the return trip the process is mirror imaged. The record is not in the open air for more that 20 seconds. A 1/2 hour?
There is one difference. After the record is away I wipe all that dust that I just ground into the record off the sweep arm (on a felt pad) I do not know which sweep arm you used but mine tracks with the tonearm perfectly and gets every spec of dust on the surface. I do have to be careful not to shake the brush when I remove it from the record or I wind up dusting the record. It is only older records I have not played for years that have any dust on them, contamination from the old paper sleeves. As I play them I am replacing all the old sleeves with new plastic ones. Records already updated have very little if any dust on them. The sweep usually comes off the record visibly clean.

Cleeds, I was not cleaning new Analog Productions albums, I was treating them with what amounts to be very cheap "Last" I know for a fact there is nothing in Last other than the solvent. Some people swear it works. So in giving them credit I am testing out a pet theory. As you know PVC compound is 0.2 or 0.3 % plasticizer. It softens the PVC making it easier to press. Removing the plasticizer conversely hardens the PVC improving it's wear characteristics. You might also take a leap and hypothesize that PVC that is not so mushy sounds better. I'm not going to spend 50 bucks on a little bottle of chlorofluorocarbon solvent to run an experiment. Certain brands of Brake Cleaning fluid are nothing but CFC solvent. I keep a case of the stuff around for cleaning bike parts and stuff. So, I sprayed both sides of five records, let them dry and put them right away. Observation #1 is that this did absolutely no immediate harm to the records. They all sound just the same. And boy do they sparkle. In a year or two I will compare them to other Analog Productions records I have that I do not play near as much, see if there is any difference in wear. 

Daveyf, for 20 bucks you can buy one and try it. It won't be near the most expensive mistake you'll ever make. Of course, if your records are already a mess you might as well take them out back and power wash them.

I had a lot of records to do so drove down to my local Home Depot paid a couple day workers $20 each to pressure wash em in the drive way. Lost a label or two for which I docked each one $5. They were more careful after that let me tell you!  

All my records are treated very carefully. No matter what you might think, set the cheeseburger down. Trust me. Also the platter is not really a platter, and should not be used for food, not even chinese, which is a shame seeing how it rotates and all.   

Static will attract dog and cat hairs, and bird feathers. When this happens use the brush attachment, do not just vacuum on the floor however much better this may seem, its not. Trust me.