Record cleaning and realistic expectations

Although I am a good little audiophile and would never think of using anything other than distilled water in my RCM solutions or alone to rinse, I do have to wonder how "minerals" in tap water could possibly do any harm, if you then vacuum dry and maybe even if you air dry the washed LPs. We are talking about very low concentrations of metals in ionic form, in solution in water.  It's not as if those ions are going to disturb tracking or groove contours. And by the way, distilled water will still have metallic ions in it, as distillation does not remove them.

And yet, when I had access to water from my lab at NIH (before I retired), which was both distilled and deionized, I used that, but still I am doubtful of the value.  As to the rest of the story, read previous lengthy and detailed threads here and read the book by Antinn.

@lewm Of course anything worth doing is worth overdoing! That is the way we operate in the world of vinyl.

@lewm When I lived in LA I used tap water on about a dozen records, and they remained unplayable until I cleaned them with a US machine. Now they are pristine.

@lewm It all depends on the initial quality of your tap water. Distillation is effective at removing suspended solids (which you certainly don't want to be deposited in your grooves), and reduces dissolved salts (otherwise desalination of sea water would not work). When tap water dries, it does not leave metal ions on the record: they will be left as salts.

I've taken to using an air still to make my own distilled water, and when I look at what is left in it at the end of a run I am very glad it isn't being left on my LPs. My tap water comes from a deep drilled well and goes through a filter cartridge that gets changed every three months, but even so...  It's instructive to let a puddle of tap water dry out on a sheet of glass and look at the residue afterwards. That's what will be left in the grooves.

Some cleaning regimens are obsessed with the rinse cycle, advocating distilled water only.  I use a VPI HW-17.  The vacuum removes whatever liquid is on the record.  Is there any reason to believe ethanol in the rinse would leave a residue?  It is distilled, it is very pure and there should be no minerals  in it.