Whats on your turntable tonight?

Dire Straits / S-T
1978 Warner Bros.
Fabulous record, amazing SQ

@slaw 

Wanting to put more cleaner than I needed.
 

Steve, I went through the same thing initially.  However, I was overlooking the fundamental purpose of the Tergitol.  It’s not the Tergitol doing the cleaning, it’s the microscopic imploding bubbles that do the cleaning.  The surfactant, in this case Tergitol, is there to reduce the surface tension of the “water-air” interface on the surface of the record.  Reducing the surface tension allows the bubbles more and better access into the grooves of the record, the whole object of the exercise.

The trick has been to find just the right amount of surfactant to get a good cleaning but not generate suds or leave too much residue behind after drying.

Definitely a work in progress.

daniel

Van Morrison - "Beautiful Vision"

I concur Daniel. You explained it more eloquently that I could.😊

I use the surfactant Audio Desk recommends. It’s more expensive than a pint of Tergitol but a vial is added to a gallon of distilled H2O and will clean 100-200 records. My AD tank holds a smidge over a gallon.
The surfactant is biodegradable, anti-static, alcohol free, odorless and doesn’t “suds up” or leave a residue. I’m only mentioning so you know an alternative. Happiness is a clean and quiet LP spinning on the phonograph, any way you get there.