Antinn, wow great post. The links provided are a great resource. Thanks for sharing. By selecting the links you provided, I was able to navigate to your book on cleaning records, V3.1. What a great resource. After reviewing the chapter on US cleaning, I take it you do not have a US machine. I apologize if I missed an explanation in your book, but may I ask why not? Do you feel other alternatives are just as good? Thanks for any words of wisdom you care to share.
Ultrasonic Record Cleaner 40 v 80 v 120 kHz
I’m new to vinyl. My table is George Merrill’s Signature Polytable. Most of the records are purchased used from local shops, which range from poor to decent condition. Hence, I need a record cleaner.
I have been researching ultrasonic (US) cleaners online, The standard US cleaners are 40 kHz. More recently, however, I’ve seen companies like Cleaner Vinyl and Degritter are offering multi kHz machines that operate at 40, 80, and 120 kHz.
Is there any evidence that the higher frequencies make a real audible difference? Or is alleged benefits just marketing hype? Any real world feedback if the higher frequencies really improve cleaning would be appreciated.
Thanks much.
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No I do not use UT. I do not clean enough records, and convenience is not something that is a priority to me. The manual process leverages chemistry (detergents & acid, Liquinox, Citranox & Tergitol) especially the acid that you would not use with the other cleaning processes and with the right brush and the right technique achieves a very clean record. But the manual sink method is technique sensitive and is not convenient and much beyond cleaning 6 records at a time is not practical. It’s pretty much as the book end of Chapter XII states: XII.16 The final chapters of this book will discuss machine assisted cleaning methods: vacuum record cleaning machines (RCM) and ultrasonic cleaning machines (UCM). It’s important to consider that machines are generally developed for two primary reasons – reduce labor and improve process efficiency. Process efficiency can mean faster (higher throughput) and/or higher probability of achieving quality or achieving a quality that manual labor cannot produce. Manual cleaning in the appropriate environment with appropriate controls can achieve impressive levels of cleanliness, but the labor, skill, time and probability of success generally make it impractical for manufacturing environments. But for the home audio enthusiast, depending on your attention to details, adopting machine assisted cleaning may or may not yield a cleaner record. However, the ease of use and convenience provided by machines can be very enticing and cannot be denied. But, let me stress, as the book Forward 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. In the final analysis, the best cleaning process is the one that is best for you. Good Luck |
The Audiodesk_Pro is a very low powered UT device. The manual Audiodesk_Pro_Manual-2018-7-Inch-Kit.pdf (galibierdesign.com) indicates an overall power of power 90W (which include the rollers) and a volume of 4.5-L which at best yields 20W/L but more likely 60W UT power for 13.3W/L. Comparing against other 40-kHz machines, the HG max power is 60W, but the UT power is ~50W in 0.4L = 125W/L while the king of the hill, the KLAudio is 200W in 0.78L = 256W/L (the KLAudio is a beast). However, the smaller tanks need more power because the ratio of tank surface area to volume is high, while the Kirmuss 35-kHz is about 165W and about 6.5L = 25W/L (it uses the same basic UT tank as the Isonic P4875 https://questforsound.com/pdfs/iSonic-catalog-P4875+MVR10.pdf. |
Speaking of iSonic, which of these two options would do a better job? |
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