Vinyl Care


I just got a new turntable and cartridge after not having one for years.

I need a recommendation for a relatively inexpensive record cleaner.

I really never took proper care of my records,and would like some basic advice on how to keep them clean on a regular basis.

I also need some guidance on care and cleaning of my cartridge and stylus.My currant cartridge is a Rega exact.

Please know that I don't have a big collection of valuable records,just a bunch of old rock recordings amassed over the past 50 years.

I have started buying some new records,but only select prized albums that I have lost or have been worn out.

Thanks.

twangy57

I mitigate static largely by how I handle LPs. I work in bare feet (as opposed to socks and/or shoes on a carpet). After the record has been cleaned, it does not exhibit a charge. Pulling a record from a tight paper sleeve can charge it, as can resleeving. I’ve found that those round bottom Japanese inners are some of the best for leaving little residue or particulate matter from the liner. 

Sure, I have had a Milty type gun forever, but rarely if ever use it. When I resleeve, I put the record in an outer jacket cover with some protection on the back side, rather than shoving it back in the jacket, which also mitigates friction and static in my experience. The rug in my listening room is a huge old Persian that is almost threadbare- we’ve had it for decades and it was very old when we bought it. It does not contribute to a charge the way a deeper pile plush rug would. 

On occasion, I’ll see dust flecks that come from the room-- though I use a pretty powerful Hepa air scrubber when the system isn’t powered up. Those I can remove through a combination of air puffer and Kinetronics Tiger Cloth that Neil @antinn turned me onto. I used to use silk for this purpose. The Tiger cloth works better and is cheap- you can find it at Amazon. 

The Miltys I’ve owned where not user friendly and not that effective. My Furutech Destat II is works great and gets a workout before and after each side.

@billstevenson 

As far as I know, Ben Franklin was the last US president to have been an experimental scientist?

He was interested in electrostatic forces, and was renowned for flying a kite into active thunderstorms.  A presidential precedence I would like to see continued today ...

 

I was rather hoping for a scientific approach to static on vinyl records - how it is caused, what its effects are, and how it is mitigated.

@lewm comes closest by attempting to use a static charge meter, and detecting no change.  But this a gross measurement tool bought to measure electrostatic panel speakers.  The charge of an electron is tiny, at 1.60217663 × 10-19 coulombs.  Moreover in our universe, as far as we know, charge is always conserved. If the material donating an electron sticks to the vinyl, there would be no net change of charge on the vinyl for any meter to detect.

As the great US physicist Richard Feynman amusingly explains, science can never prove a theory right, but it can prove it wrong.

This video is a must see:  Feynman on Scientific Method.

Benjamin Franklin will be most surprised to discover that he was US president....

(Though he was President of Pennsylvania prior to the formation of the US).