Best Record Cleaning Fluid

Ok Cleeds. How do you know that? Just because Steve Hoffman say it does not mean it is true. Trust me on this one. Nobody at MFSL is a materials scientist. They are way more interested in marketing. With the original releases they cut the gain so nobody would miss track and boosted the bass which made things sound more dynamic if odd. The materials scientists all say we would be better off using a polyimide and toss the PVC.  I have been up and down the internet getting a better picture of the chemistry as I had always assumed that there was nothing but carbon black and PVC in record vinyl as that is how it was always presented to me and I have been in a pressing plant and watched the process. Assumptions are the mother of all fuck ups and I got caught in it. I have always said making mistakes is the best way to learn. I'm learning now.
Most SuperVinyls are just virgin vinyl that has no recycle in it perhaps using a plant that is more fastidious about its process. After they trim the record edges the excess and all the contaminants it has been exposed to get thrown back into the pot. Most records are 20-30% recycled vinyl. The plants are usually a mess. Just cleaning up helps. The Japanese have proven that 
There is nothing wrong with carbon black in the very small amount used something like 0.05%. It is true if the percentage gets too high the record will develop a hiss. But carbon black has other specific advantages. It makes the vinyl tougher and more slippery according to what I have read. I have EMI and Decca records that are dead silent and they say nothing about SuperVinyl on them. However there are probably tweeks that could improve PVC. On the other other hand if you really wanted to improve records you would bite the bullet and accept the higher cost of a polyimide which according to several sources would make a significantly better record. ljgerens probably knows more about this than I do. 

bdp24, I beg to differ. The only pathetic vinyl collection is no collection.
I have stated my position that the best way to keep clean records is don't let them get dirty in the first place. It is an approach that has worked perfectly for myself and several acquaintances for decades with the caveat of used records and the rare occasional salsa food fight.  
Having said this the single most important characteristic in any cleaning fluid is that it leave absolutely no residue. Distilled water, no residue. Isopropyl alcholol, no residue except when cleeds uses it because it causes him to melt into the record. Oh by the way cleeds there is a difference between a study where you are looking for an effect in a cohort and a simple experiment where you are trying to prove or disprove a simple hypothesis like does isopropyl alcohol damage records. The study needs controls. The simple experiment does not.
Right, no residue. A modern stylus can pick up an irregularity in the vinyl down to 0.1 microns. It is hard to do that if your stylus is piled up with gunk. Clean your stylus well with whatever you favorite stylus cleaning stuff is. I use 50/50 distilled water and 91% isopropyl. Isopropyl will not at all harm cured epoxy or any of the modern UV cured adhesives. ( If it did all of cleeds teeth would fall out every time he had a scotch and soda.) Works great, dries fast. Play a record and look at the stylus under magnification. There should be very little if anything on there after just one side. If you have a glob on there you have a problem be it with just goopy records from exposure to smoke or cooking fumes or the stuff left behind by your record cleaner. 
There is very little magic to cleaners and solvents. It seems to me all these "magic" formulas for cleaning records (Have you noticed how no one wants to tell you what is in there?) are just another audiophile scam.
If I were up for a record cleaner I would go for one of those distilled water only ultrasonic guys. 
Tatyana69, get off the train. Mix 3/4 cup distilled water with 1/4 cup 91% isopropyl alcohol from CVS, Rite Aid or whatever pharmacy you use. Clean an old record with it and see what you think. Let us know. 

Oh, I forgot to mention It was noted by several materials science people that polyimides would make a much better record than PVC but would require a different process to manufacture. So If MFSL really wanted to knock it out of the ball park they could create the process and make Polyimide records. Then they could charge $1000 for a record:)

Here is the best dissertation I could find on the subject in layperson's terms.   http://pspatialaudio.com/pvc.htm 
As Regan said, "Facts are funny things." MFSL is a marketing firm. I have purchased their stuff since the early 80's. I have the completes Beatles set and the complete Stones Set as well as several UHQ discs like Crime of the century. Their game was to try and use virgin vinyl and better pressing plants so they could lower the gain so everybody's cartridge had an easy time tracking, and boost the bass which a lot of us complained about. Unfortunately, the lower gain created records that got unacceptably noisy if treated anything but absolutely perfect. Today's MFSL when compared to Analog Productions and a lot of the old European classical stuff is second rate. It is better than routine stuff for sure but it is not the last word and I certainly do not plan on buying any of the new UHQ records for that kind of money especially when I can get most of the stuff the market in high def digital down loads. However their PVC is compounded makes no difference. The very small quantity of carbon black added to PVC 0.2% makes absolutely no difference in the quality of the sound so using a substitute probably means nothing. As long as virgin vinyl is used the quality of the pressing is determined more by technique and cleanliness.  By the way as you can read in the link above most of the stuff compounded into the vinyl has nothing to do with sound quality but rather to prevent problems that occur with the process. 

Whoops! I forgot to add the link in my last comment. Here it is
https://www.yoursoundmatters.com/is-it-safe-to-clean-vinyl-records-with-alcohol/
I just ordered a bottle of Triton X ,  99% isopropyl alcohol and benzalkonium chloride. I am going to experiment with a 10% alcohol solution and an undetermined  quantity of Triton X and benzalkonium chloride. I'll probably start with 0.5% Triton and 0.1% benzalkonium chloride. The Triton is a cationic detergent and surfactant. The benzalkonium chloride kills fungus and is supposed to lubricate the groove. The general consensus is that up to 10% alcohol is perfectly safe. One article related that over 60% is certainly dangerous. My usual mix was 25%.  

Here is an interesting and non committed article I found. I love the bit about isopropyl alcohol evaporating too fast. That is why we use it in solution with distilled water. You can adjust the vapor pressure by adjusting the concentration of the alcohol. For cleaning car windows I use 75% isopropyl in distilled water. It cleans great and dries fast. For records I use 25% isopropyl in distilled water. It dries a bit slower. There is no residue in medical grade alcohol and there should not be any in distilled water. I filled a sparkling clean wine glass with the 25% mixture and let it evaporate. The glass was just as clean afterwards so there is no visible residue. 

I just opened a conversation with ThermoFisher Scientific. They are a materials science firm. Perhaps they can let us know how record PVC is formulated.

Thanx for the explanation ljergens. Obviously I was wrong. I believe during the stamping process PVC temperatures reach 300 F. Carbon Black is obviously added to all black records and I have read that it contains lead which acts as a stabilizer.Medical PVC has the phthalate DEHP in it which has been studies intensively for side effects in animals. I believe phthalates are the most common plasticizers but I can not find any mention of them being added to PVC for records. The PVC for records comes in bags of pellets that are premixed with carbon black and whatever else is in there. I am trying to find out who supplies the pellets to firm up the list of compounds added to the PVC and their concentrations. The next question is will Isopropyl alcohol damage records. I believe this is a myth. I have an old record sitting in a tub of 91% isopropyl alcohol now. It has been in it for 3 days.  
Very creative Terry9. At least you know what is in there unlike all the audiophile stuff. 

Right on cleeds. There is a method to handling records. As cleeds relates do not touch the playing surface. ljgerens you are right in regards to oils. They are very fugitive however if you wash your hands before handling the records the transfer of skin oils to the record is minimal if you are handling the record correctly. But if you like wearing clean room gloves and get them cheap why not. I have never worn clean room gloves and you will never find a finger print on any of my records. 
CuCL2 is brown. It absorbs moisture to form the dihydrate which is light blue. To form Malachite or Brochantite, both green, copper is fully oxidized then on exposure to atmospheric contaminants forms these compounds also termed patina.  Chlorine is not involved. The only references I can find in regard to PVC releasing HCL relate this to the PVC being burned like in a house fire. 

barbapapa, are you kidding me? Look how PVC is made. If everyone here was so concerned about the environment we would all stop buying vinyl immediately and toss our turntables in the garbage. I'm more worried about what we will make our records out of once all the oil is gone:( The best way to keep your records clean is not to let them get dirty. I started collecting records when I was 13. I did not have my act together in terms of record care until I was 17 when I made a hinging dust cover for my TD 124. At about the same time I replaced the ADC Pritchard tonearm the table came with with an SME. I modified the ADC Pritchard by mounting an artist's brush head in the head shell.The idea came as a result of using a Stanton cartridge with the brush up front. Talking about skating force! It worked great except boy did it make static electricity. I got shocked every time I changed a record. So I wrapped the brush with fine copper wire almost down to the end and connected it to the green head shell wire which was connected to ground. I have been using a grounded record brush ever since. The older records had to be cleaned but remain noisy. All the later records have never been cleaned and are all as good as the day I bought them (except for the rare accident.) 
If you have dirty records I think the best way to clean them is an ultrasonic cleaner with distilled water. Unfortunately, a lot of pollutants inside a house are non polar molecules from cooking. Water as a polar solvent has a hard time dissolving these molecules without the help of Ultrasound so in every other type of cleaning machine you need something in the water that will dissolve them. I like isopropyl alcohol.
It is a relatively weak solvent but it evaporates quickly and leaves absolutely no residue. With a little agitation like in a Spin Clean it works fine. If people want to spend their money on all that other magic stuff that is their prerogative. Me? The only time my records are exposed to the environment is the 30 seconds it takes to go the three feet from where the record is removed from it's rice paper sleeve to the turntable, needle and brush drop, Dust cover down. Then of course back again to the sleeve.  https://www.sleevecityusa.com/Antistatic-Record-Cleaning-Arm-p/tac-01.htm

ljgerens, thank you for the explanation.The copper turning green is due to oxidation. PVC like siding which is exposed continuously to high temps and UV light has stabilizers in it. The PVC used in records is exposed to high heat once for only a short period of time and gets hardly any UV exposure because it spends the vast majority of its time in its jacket. The lead in the carbon black acts as a stabilizer but other than that I can find no evidence anywhere that PVC used for the manufacture of records has anything in it but carbon black. I would love to see evidence to the contrary. 

Voiceofvinyl, there have been many approaches to making records mostly adjusting gain, various compression schemes and adjusting the weight of the puck. Wickipedia has a long article on this and it does talk about all of RCA's meanderings. Columbia was another company that tried various approaches in competition with RCA. I have several JVC Super Vinyl records, excuse me they are JVC Direct Discs, the three Lee Ritenour records, Gentle Thoughts, Sugar Loaf Express and Friendship.
They are great records. I terms of quality they used a thicker puck and the Japanese are a lot more fastidious about their pressing technique and cleanliness so their pressings are very quiet. You will notice that all the highest quality discs are done on black plastic. The carbon black does have lead in it and if you have ever handled raw lead it is slippery and feels sort of greasy. Other colored discs are noisier. My own experience backs this up. Having said all this the absolute quietest discs I have are British! Older EMIs , Decca and Mercury pressings are just wonderful. Only Analog Productions comes close to that level of quality. I suspect it is due to things like cleanliness, less or no recycled vinyl and changing the stampers more frequently. 

Cleeds, I am saying this independently of my other posts so that when you report me to the moderator he doesn't erase all the really important self serving stuff I have typed about elsewhere. Is your stylus aimed in the right direction? 20 degrees is pitiful. I doubt it would work at that angle. You might try some lube. 

Very few records are made of 100% virgin vinyl. The industry standard is 70% virgin and 30% recycled. The recycled is coming from the trim pieces created during the pressing process. A small amount of PVC is extruded beyond the 12 inch circumference of the record. This is trimmed off and recycled. Problem is that it is exposed to possible contamination which might make the next record noisier. There are several videos that show this process. The so called virgin vinyl records have none of this remix in them. But still, this is a complicated process which can be contaminated at many levels. It is very difficult to maintain an absolutely clean process and remain commercially viable. 
In regards to additives I would be happy to see absolute proof that anybody is adding anything to the PVC other than colorant. Additives would only increase the cost of the vinyl and so far have only created inferior product as far as I can tell. I would be willing to bet that all the pressing plants are getting their PVC from one or two sources that make pellets specifically for the purpose of pressing records. Unique formulations? My back side. These people have a hard enough time keeping the vinyl clean and noise free. PVC needs no help doing its job otherwise. All those patents have been ignored by the industry. Call up a pressing plant and ask them where they get their PVC pellets from then call that company and ask if they add anything to the PVC other than colorant. Provide us with the companies and their phone numbers so we can verify the information. Prove me wrong. Make me learn something. I hate hidden secrets and all this mystery. 

voiceofvinyl, that is exactly the thread I commented on before. It is quoting old patent applications. None of that stuff is used in the commercial industry. Look at the comments below in that thread. It is all a big joke.
The only stuff in PVC pellets is PVC and Carbon Black. If there were other additives you would be able to find 1000 threads on line about what that stuff is and you can't because I just spent an hour looking to make sure I was not FOS. You also did not read my comment on the Tergitol.
Tergitol is an alcohol! All the record cleaning companies want you to know alcohol is bad for your records so you will buy their stuff. Don't fall for it. 
Cleeds, It is Mr Kirmuss who says that not me. Ultrasound is perfectly safe. Look at your stylus carefully from the side. If you have not bent your cantilever and your tonearm is parallel to the record your stylus vertical axis will be angled around 20 degrees with the tip pointed back towards the tonearm bearing. If it is not I would send it back and ask for a refund.
It is angled like that because that is the angle the cutting chisel makes. 
As for the pressure a stylus exerts on the record that is simple math. You just have to know the combined area of the two contact patches. Use a weight of 2 grams then just convert the whole mess into pounds per square inch. Why don't you figure it out for us. As to whether of not vinyl goes liquid at that pressure I sort of doubt it. As you suggest friction and pressure generate heat. But I know of no infrared thermometer with resolution high enough to read the contact patch of a phonograph stylus.
At any rate the vinyl recovers and the wear rate under clean conditions is pretty slow all things considered. 

geoffkait, (with two fs), glad you joined in. Would that be Tightbond 1, 2 or 3? 

cleeds, by all means stick with your distilled water and ultrasound. But you'd better be careful because according to Mr Kirmuss if you use the wrong frequency you could damage your record!
Lets think about this for a second. A record will take several thousand pounds per square inch of stylus trying to dig into it at a rake angle of 20 degrees but it can't handle ultrasonic water bubbles? Boggles the mind doesn't it?

Black records sound better and last longer because the carbon black makes the vinyl harder (less compressible) and supposedly there are trace amounts of lead in it that act as a lubricant making the vinyl more slippery. I could only find one post on this. There is a post on Vinyl Engine
that is a beautifully written sort of hoax where a guy named Vince comes up with a lot of old patents aimed at making vinyl records better by adding this that and the other. None of this was ever done on a commercial basis. The bit about heated PVC making HCL is the funniest part. My guess is that these myths about records were generated by people and companies that make record cleaning stuff as a reason to buy their stuff.
I also forget to mention that Tergitol which as voiceofvinyl related earlier is used by the Smithsonian to clean record has a hydroxyl group stuck to the end of it:))) That would make it.......an ALCOHOL. Noe I have to figure out a way to get clearthink to use brake cleaning fluid on his records:)

Oh for accuracy's sake there is one additive to the PVC and that is the colorant which usually is carbon black. Unexpanded PVC is clear, expanded PVC is white (plumbing). 

Clearthink, I never intended that we should all use brake cleaning fluid to clean our records. I know for a fact that there are no plasticizers on vinyl records. For fun I used the strongest non polar solvent that I knew would not melt the record to see if I could remove anything from the surface of an old Byrds Record (I have a digital copy) that I had never cleaned. I could not and the record was not damaged at all by the process. I performed an experiment for fun. 
Voiceofvinyl, the plasticizer thing is a myth. You can see how records are pressed in a number of videos. Raw PVC pellets are heated to the melting point and shaped into a puck at 300 degrees F. That puck is placed into the center of the press with the labels and several tons of pressure are used to form the record. Nothing is sprayed on the stampers. There is no "mold release" and there are no "plasticisers" added to the PVC. Vinyl has to withstand a huge amount of pressure from the stylus, thousands of pounds per square inch. The last thing you would want to do is soften it. Alcohol and even brake cleaning fluid remove absolutely nothing from records.  

Looking back voiceofvinyl obviously has a lot more experience cleaning records than I do. Tergitol would certainly be a reasonable additive to distilled water and it is quite true that certain fungi will grow on records. Down in Florida I saw many records that were stored in high humidity conditions destroyed by the stuff. You could see it on the records and sleeves not to mention smell it. I suppose if the growth were not that bad you might be able to bring them back. But in reality this is a record storage and handling problem. Records should be stored below 75 degrees in relative humidities no greater than 50%. They should be stored in clean plastic sleeves, upright under pressure by which I mean you should just have a little trouble getting another record in there. The classic orange crate works great until you can design record storage shelves which you can see in any Michael Fremer video. You should never leave your records flat or leaning. Ideally a record should go right from the shelf to the turntable preferably with a dust cover and grounded sweep arm 
( https://www.sleevecityusa.com/Antistatic-Record-Cleaning-Arm-p/tac-01.htm) then returned to to the sleeve and the shelf immediately after. 
The grounded sweep arm has been downplayed by various members on this forum. It does two things. It sweeps incidental dust out of the way of the stylus and discharges the record while it is playing so that the record never collects a static charge. The static charge is created by the stylus rubbing in the groove. Play a record without the brush and if you position yourself in the light right, as you remove the disc from your table you will see dust fly right to the record along with smoke and anything else that happens to be in the air at the time. Play a record with the brush and nothing flies to the record. The only way to improve on this is to play your records in a clean room. The brush is a little finicky in ways. The spindle to bearing distance has to be just right or it will not track the record correctly. Same if it is not clean. I have a piece of felt stuck to the table that I wipe it off on between plays and every so often I'll clean the felt with alcohol and a standard record brush. In 50 years of doing this I have not found a more effective way of keeping records clean in my hands anyway. I do not have a record cleaning machine. No need for one. For the rare outside or used record I use a spin clean with distilled water and alcohol. Anbody who thinks isopropyl alcohol damages records....how should I be politically correct about this. How's about," is susceptible to Marxist marketing schemes." 
I should also note in regards to my previous post that there are different kinds of brake cleaning fluid. The one I used was one of the old fashioned chlorofluorocarbon type (Freon).  Some of the newer ones might melt your record.    

Nothing like having an SEM at your disposal. scott69 how were you cleaning the records? A lot of people are going to say if you did it one way or another you would not have gotten the same results particularly the ultrasonic people. Since you are a chemist do you have any comments to make about PVC and "plastasizers?" My understanding is that PVC is very inert stuff. I find it hard to believe that there is anything that could somehow change the molecular characteristics of PVC to say make it more durable under the 4000 lbs per square inch that it is subjected to every time a stylus passes over it.  

Voiceofvinyl, plasticizer molecules? Another myth. You can take brake cleaning fluid and spray it all over a record and rub the crap out of it with a white cotton cloth and you will not see any residue on the cloth (assuming the record was clean) and there will be absolutely no damage to the record. I know that for a fact because I am listening to the one I just did that too!! Damn clean to but the stuff stinks. No residue!! That is it! The best record cleaning is Brake cleaning fluid. Dirt cheap, just spray it on and blast it off with a little compressed air. Do wear a mask.

mofimadness, I do not know what cleaning technique you use and it is probably more advanced than what I do but if you use a Spin Clean with L' Art if you do not do a separate rinse cycle with distilled water the residue will gum up your stylus after just a few plays. I rarely have to clean a record so I am not about to spend a fortune on an elaborate cleaning machine so my experience with them is limited but perhaps a vacuum pick up might remove enough so this does not happen? 
cleeds I must be a genius as you keep following me around. Lets see how perceptive you are. Lets run an experiment. Get a big frying pan, bigger than 12" diameter. Fill it with 91% isopropyl  alcohol, put a record in it and cover it tight so the alcohol does not evaporate. Leave it in there for a week, dry it off then give it a play. Tell us what happens.
Correct. Nothing will entirely eliminate dust from the surface of an LP. Using a grounded sweep arm keeps the dust away from the stylus and shorts out the record so it does not collect static electricity and become a powerful dust magnet. I can't imagine why you can't learn to use one correctly. They are very simple devices. 
millercarbon, cheers!

Denatured alcohol is bad news on vinyl but Isopropyl is fine. I mix 75% distilled water to 25% 91% isopropyl. The alcohol increases the vapor pressure of the solution (drys faster). I tried  L'Art Du Son. It works but you have to rinse the record well of you will leave a residue making it a PITA. The real trick in having clean records is don't let them get dirty in the first place. The talk of records having some kind of residue from the factory is pure BS. If you use a dust cover, a grounded sweep arm and never smoke or cook around open records you will never have a problem. Buying used records is another problem altogether. Those I always clean first because you have no idea were they have been. It is always best to buy large estate sales. Larger collections have much less wear. You pick out the discs you like then sell the rest to Michael Fremer:)