Record cleaner

I have only heard of and use distilled myself...

This thread and many others that I have read indicate that distilled water is not what should be used.

I don't kmow much but I do know a little about water treatment. I do it for a living, working for "Imagination at Work". Distilled would be preferred over demineralized or deionized or simple filter purified water. Assuming receiving vessels, transfer lines, along with any final storage containers en route to you are "clean"...this will have the lowest mineral content. Distillation basically evaporates water leaving behind all dissolved solids (mineral species) and suspended solids (particulates). Then the water as steam or vapor is condensed back to liquid form. Multi stage distillation improves the quality of product water (same applies to good vodka and product ethanol). Deionization - particularly when done with resins - can result in a water that is highly contaminated with microorganisms. Resin beds do tend to become microbiologically fouled over time. There are more exotic demineralization and filtration processes that can provide a high quality/reduced mineral content water (e.g., RO) - but from an accessibility/reliability/purity point of view - distilled to me is the way to go.

Ketchup - I'd be very interested in knowing what specific issues were raised relative to use of distilled water for LP cleaning. I can't really see any - it's as pure as you can get but it's not like I'm infallible on this particular application. Storage and handling are the wild cards - but these caveats would apply to water produced by any purification/demineralization process.

Ghosthouse,
If accessibility and cost weren't a factor, what would you use?

If you're on the internet, have a mailing address and you can afford $159.00 there's the KAB EV-1. It has made a big improvement in my vinyl playback. Otherwise you can build one.