Best Temporary Record Cleaning Options

Personally, I would not waste the money on many of the so called "temporary" solutions, for marginally more (about $200 U.S.) you can purchase a KAB EV1 (if you already have a decent vacuum), a bottle of RRL Super Vinyl Wash and a carbon fibre brush and you will have virtually state of the art record cleaning that will be at least as good as any of the Nitty Gritty or VPI models and approximate the Monks/Loricraft units (or better them if inferior fluids are being used with them) for a fraction of the price. You will also need a scrap turntable (for best results) but that should be pretty easily available for next to nothing (try going to an audio shop and just asking for a junk trade-in).

Doug: I can only tell you this: I had records cleaned professionally on a Monks using Nitty Gritty fluid just before I purchased my EV1. Recleaning the Monks cleaned records on the EV1 (with my Filter Queen vac) with RRL, followed by a lab grade water rinse (yeah, I know the RRL doesn't need a rinse) yielded a much better sounding record. Could be a number of things: residue from the Nitty Gritty fluid, a "quickie" job done by whoever did the Monks cleaning at the record store, etc. etc. And I am pretty finicky about the way I clean with the KAB, so maybe it's just the extra time I put into it. This was with relatively clean records; the Monnks/Loricraft may do better with really grimey records, but the KAB/RRL combo, combined with the Nitty Gritty fluid in between (the alcohol in the Nitty Gritty cuts through grime, fingerprints better) does very well even on really digustingly dirty records.

Valid points, Doug, and as I stated above, there are many variables. Choice of fluids is obviously critical and we are much more in agreement than disagreement as you say. The fact that the KAB/decent vacuum/RRL combo can improve upon the Monks/Nitty Gritty combo even on a comparative basis on a 2nd/following cleaning at about 1/25th of the price is pretty impressive though and the main point I was trying to make. I think that many would say that the Keith Monks, for $5,000 with just about any decent fluid should not leave anything behind for the $159 KAB to pick up on a 2nd cleaning. I've had the opportunity to pick up a used Monks at a very reasonable price, but based on my experiences, just don't have the interest in doing so.