The "Very Best Record Cleaning Formulation"

@pindac, @whart, and any others reading,

Thank-you for the kind words. 

Keep in-mind that what I present is a process - not a single chemistry.  My aqueous process is centered around pre-clean, rinse, final-clean, rinse and is the industry standard for precision cleaning with aqueous cleaner and as the book states Chapter II: 

The manual precision aqueous vinyl record cleaning procedure detailed by this document began with the cleaning process used by the United States Library of Congress to clean delicate lacquer records. That procedure was then modified following the fundamentals developed for MIL-STD-1330D Precision Cleaning and Testing of Shipboard Oxygen, Helium, Helium-Oxygen, Nitrogen, And Hydrogen Systems and MIL-STD-1622B Standard Practice for Cleaning of Shipboard Compressed Air Systems.   

To refresh:  I developed MIL-STD-1330D and MIL-STD-1622B as well as the jointly patented cleaning agent - Navy Oxygen Cleaner (NOC), and if you were to read NASA procedures for aqueous cleaning of high-pressure oxygen, you would see similar pre-clean, rinse, final clean, rinse processes.  

So, I present a 'process', not a single chemical.  The book presents various options for pre-cleaner and final cleaner chemistry, and as the book states:  All cleaning procedures specified herein are presented as only “a” way to clean a record. No claim is made there is only one way to approach the process. All methods & procedures specified here present opportunity for experimenting with different cleaning agents, different cleaning brushes, different drying cloths, and different cleaning equipment.

So, this whole hoopla has nothing to do with someone else's chemistry which the concept of alcohol + nonionic surfactant is nothing new.  If you read VIII.15.1 London Jazz Collector™ (LJC) LJC home recipe for vacuum record cleaning machines | LondonJazzCollector (wordpress.com) he indicates it's for vacuum record cleaning machines and does not recommend allowing to just evaporate to prevent leaving dissolved contaminants.  And if you analyze his formula (by volume), it's as follows: 25% IPA & 250 ppm nonionic surfactant (likely at 8 x CMC).   

The formula provided by @wizzzard is by weight 22% ethanol and 0.038% Tergitol 15-S-7 which ~380 ppm which is 10 x CMC.  If you review and understand Table XIII Hansen Solubility Parameter Record Polymers & Solvents, you will see the differences between 100% IPA and 100% Ethanol.  Based on @wizzzard  'credentials' it should be child's-play for him to do a comparison of two formulas - IPA + Tegitol 15-S-9 (which are inexpensive & easy obtained) and Ethanol + Tergitol 15-S-7 (which may not as inexpensive or as easily obtained); and hopefully he could put this in both 'by-weight' and 'by-volume' to make it more accessible to the average person and let people decide for themselves.

But, because I have a name, and you can find me, for liability reasons I will not make any recommendation for use of alcohol above 2.5%.  Additionally, I am not here to formulate cleaning agents - I let others do that.  Otherwise, my background in some of the most intensive quality assurance programs in world (Navy SUBSAFE The U.S. Navy’s Submarine Safety Standards (bsee.gov) & Deep Submergence Diver Life Support) and my development of the MIL-STDs to clean high-pressure oxygen and life support systems and the need to have every final cleaner approved by a three-panel medical board (toxicology, internal medicine & industrial health) have left me acutely sensitive to being protective of human health.  If I am to be criticized for being overly protective - guilty as charged. So, I will advise of the risk - beyond that you are free to take as many risks as you wish but you are at least fully aware; that is my policy.

So, myself and @wizzzard are fundamentally different - he is presenting a chemistry, I am presenting a 'process'; and it's my experience with developing and implementing (world-wide) precision cleaning processes - that to effectively clean a record - you need a process, and every process be it manual cleaning, manual-cleaning with vacuum assistance or ultrasonic cleaning, and combinations thereof require a variation of the chemistry for best results. 

Beyond that, I am not here to defend or promote my process.  The book goes into excruciating detail trying to explain the whys behind the process including a deep dive (Chapter XI) into just how clean the record needs to be to extract all the music it contains.  If you agree, that's great, if you don't, that's OK.  I am selling nothing and make no income from the book, and it was a good exercise to keep my skillsets high when I 'was' retired - no more, back to work and I really do not have the time anymore to expend as I have in the past.  So, this is likely my last post on this forum.

Take care and stay-well,

Neil Antin

PS/Given the state of affairs in cyber-space, I have adopted the 'zero-trust' cyber position, and consequently, I am now being very careful as to just what personally identifiable information (PII) I disclose.  

Due to my location, I have used BASF™ Dehypon® LS 54 nonionic surfactant. as a substitute for  Tergitol 15-S-9.

I see that  Tergitol 15-S-7 is the recommended substance within this thread.

As previous experience showed it was going to be expensive to acquire Tergitol, and it is not readily available in the UK. The acquiring the alternative Dehypon came with a large proportion of monies outlaid for the assembling the materials to enable the Manual Cleaning Method to be put in place.

I would be happiest if the Dehypon was identified as being usable with the mixture being proposed by @wizzzard. Acquiring the Ethanol as per the Purity suggested, is looking relatively easy, and is available at a fair cost. 

I invested in a accurate weighing scale, and would like to know the mixture in weight of grams of Dehypon per 220 grams of Ethanol, if this is considered a mixture worthwhile producing.  

Pindac, very often identical nonionic detergents are sold under different names, depending upon the manufacturer or patent holders. You might check to determine the chemical relationship between your preferred preparation and either tergitol S7 or S9. Maybe there is chemical identity to one or the other or maybe there are only small differences in properties that are of little consequence.

mijostyn

I do not care for ultrasonic cleaning. It is messy, inconvenient and of questionable effectiveness.

US cleaning is just about all I've used after buying a Klaudio US machine. Its one-button simplicity just can't be beat, imo. Nothing could be easier or more tidy.

I think an alcohol is a very important part of a proper record cleaning formula.

That's a remarkable statement from someone who until recently insisted nothing other than a conductive sweep brush was needed to ensure a clean LP.

I can't help but wonder what contamination these LPs have accumulated that require substantial amounts of alcohol to remove.

@cleeds , I was given a large collection of 78 rpm and old LPs. In order to deal with them I had to buy a record cleaning machine and deal with the peculiarities of  of record cleaning. Had this not happened I would still be merrily plugging along with my sweep arm. 1st off, I have to qualify the alcohol comment. It is limited solely to PVC records. If you use alcohol on old 78s you will melt them. 

In the mean while I discovered that vacuum clamping generates large static charges on the bottom of the record, strong enough to jump sparks to the head shell when removing the record. In playing with cleaning solutions I stumbled into the use of ionic agents to prevent static accumulation. BAK does exactly this and the effect is lasting. 

I looked carefully at the KL Audio and  Degritter units before going the way I did. It is a mistake to air or fan dry a record. Doing so leaves whatever is in the water on the record. Reuse the water in an ultrasonic cleaner and you will wind up with a lot of garbage on the record. Filtering is not good enough because many contaminants will be in solution and will not filter out. In short you would have to buy a vacuum drying machine in addition. The Clearaudio Double Matrix Sonic Pro not only uses fresh fluid with each cleaning it actually rinses the record three times each cycle before drying and it is doing both sides at the same time. 2 minutes and the record is clean and dry both sides. It is expensive but I stumbled over an open box deal for a 20% discount. Sometimes you have to be lucky. Unfortunately, whoever opened the box put some ungodly fluid in it, unknown to me that caused the water pump to fail. Musical Surroundings asked if I though I could take it apart and sent me a new pump. I opened it up and there was white junk all through the water lines and water tank. I cleaned it all out, installed the new pump and it has been perfect ever since. I can also take it apart with my eyes closed. The pump was covered under warranty.

Sometimes life drives you in funny directions. 

The Wizzard's Formula was strikingly close to the one I landed on. It is obvious to me that he knows in detail exactly what he is talking about and I plan on incorporating some of his changes. I suspect he is of eastern European origin and culturally they are a bit on the gruff side. So am I.