Record Sleeves - Which ones and where?

Cytocycle,
I've been giving the albums a dry brush treatment before putting them in the new sleeves. I'll do a thorough wash when I get my Kab EV-1. I'm going to get some sample sleeves for a penny each at Sleeve Town and compare. I'll post my findings when they get here.

Hello Spenceroo,
To tell the truth, I'm unsure what these Japanese Outer Sleeves were in thickness, and perhaps I was correct the first time with my rememberence that they were 6 Mil? lol

Anyhow, they are nice, aren't they?

Sadly, all these little goodies we buy are somewhat expensive. I just ordered some RRL Cleaning products, and I know they are very good, but it does hurt when you think for a second that these liquids cost $100 to $200 a Gallon! And we thought Gasoline was expensive.

Do let us know when the KAB EV-1 Machine arrives, and how you like it. I'll be interested to hear how it works, and it's ease of use. Mark

Spenceroo,
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My experience with Sleeve City (Sleevetown) has been much different than that of Emailist.

For me they have been terrific and give great customer service. All of the sleeve sellers by in bulk from manufacturers and can have production or packing problems from time to time. I have been working with Sleeve City for 4 years now, had one problem (I mis-ordered) and they took back the sleeves with no hassle and replaced them with what I meant to have ordered.
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They will also give you a bit of a discount (around 10-15% , can’t remember exactly) if your make a larger order.
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I have tried several inner sleeves and found the MFSL to be by far the best. They also have a nice advantage of having some printing on one side that directs you to the opening in the sleeve (seems small, but a nice convenience). They are a bit more expensive, but well worth the money.
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The best outer sleeves have been the Poly pro 5 mil polypropylene. They are clear and large enough to let the LP’s easily drop in and handle the double LP’s as well. They happen to be on sale now.
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Below are links and the product description they list on their website for both the Inner Sleeves and Outer Sleeves that I have recommending.

Information for the Inner sleeves

http://www.sleevetown.com/lp-sleeves-inner.shtml

Mobile Fidelity Master Sleeves - These are the same high-quality inner sleeves used by Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab for their vinyl releases. They are imported, three-ply, anti-static, premium sleeves (similar to rice paper) and work with both LPs and laser discs. Back construction consists of a paper layer sandwiched between two sheets of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) with a translucent HDPE front. This equals or surpasses the discontinued VRP inner sleeves.

Information for the Outer sleeves

http://www.sleevetown.com/lp-sleeves-outer.shtml

SALE! Ultimate Outer 5.0 - a clearly better outer record sleeve that doesn't get cloudy. Manufactured from crystal 250 micron clear polypropylene, sleeves fit loosely over outside of jacket, 12.75" X 12.75". Our heaviest weight outer sleeve, yet it retains the sparkling clarity of polypro. Price decreases with quantity. Get a sample for only a penny!

Hi Mark,
Yes, the sleeves are really nice. Seem like the manufacturers have us over a barrel on the cost of this stuff though. Sometimes I wonder how much more effective these cleaning fluids are over the homemade varieties. My plan is to give each of my albums a good cleaning with vinyl-zyme and then do a really good cleaning with RRL wash ($25 / quart). I'm then hoping that with the new sleeves, I'll only have to do a dry brush cleaning before each play. I did a lot of research on cleaning machines, and the Kab seems to do every bit as good as one of the expensive motor driven units. I found a small shop vac (2 gallon version) at a yard sale with some of the albums, and read that it will work even better than the motorized RCM's because of the better suction. The only difference being manual rotation of the record for cleaning. I know that some people say not to use a shop vac (larger models) with the Kab, but I'm going to try it anyways on a scrap record and see what happens.

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Spenceroo,
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I suggest that you call Jim Pendleton an order sample size bottles of all 4 steps of his Audio Intelligent cleaning system.
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I used RRL for several years and thought I was happy until I tried Audio Intelligent cleaning system. There was a definite sonic difference....not subtle.
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You can contact Jim at his website: http://www.audiointelligent.com/ or call @ (573) 696-3551. Great guy to talk with and quite impressive.
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Rgds,
Larry
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