Cleaning records. How often really?

Albert, if you like the Premier cleaner, then buy it here like I do:

http://www.all-spec.com/products/MCCCCC.html

It's the EXACT SAME STUFF as Premier and as you can see, much less expensive! I understood it is more a replacement for carbon tetrachloride than for freon. It's a better solvent than either of them IMO; it dries fast (too fast!) and leaves NO residue. It's especially great for cleaning electronics too -- especially that stuff you're afraid to use most cleaners on, like tube sockets! (I don't actually use it on records anymore.)
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One way to get rid of the residual dust that gets past filters, seals and every other mechanical strategy available, is ionization. There are room ionizers and whole house units (even some that can be installed in an existing HVAC system.)

They act by charging airborne particulates so that they are strongly attracted to ground, and settle to the floor. If the floor is carpeted, that's helpful as they tend to remain collected there until vacuumed up.

Speaking of 'grounding', like many folks, I usually gave my records a swipe with a carbon brush just before lowering the stylus. But I was never satisfied with the result, because dust remained on the record, or got re-attracted to the vinyl surface during play. I thought of some tips I'd seen or read about attaching a ground(ed) wire to the brush. In theory, that should have solved the problem; but after implementing this suggestion, the results were nil. I was puzzled -- until I realized that the carbon bristles were not electrically in contact with the metal of the brush handle! So wire or no wire, there was simply no way for the charge to drain to ground! I could only find one carbon-fiber brush which construction satisfied this requirement, and that is the Hunt EDA No. 6 brush. The carbon bristles are clamped firmly into the aluminum handle; so if you run a wire from the handle to a suitable ground, a single brush swipe will remove all the remaining dust from your record AND it will also remove any remaining charge from the vinyl itself, so it won't attract more dust while it's playing.
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Hello Ct0517

Re the Premier products: it looks like Soundstage, MusicDirect, and Acoustic Sounds all list the item as discontinued? All I know is it's still available from All-Spec, and when I took the time to look closely at fine print on both products, they use the same bar code and list the same manufacturer and part no.

As for the Panasonic record brush -- looks very cool! But it won't remove static from a record because it's not grounded -- and so there's nowhere for the static charge to go. The only NON-GROUNDED device that is effective is the Zero-stat (or other gun) and they work by NEUTRALIZING the (negative) static charge with a positive ion discharge. I have one of those too (the Ortofon version) and it works alright, but it doesn't discharge the static like a grounded carbon-fiber brush.

If anyone wants to inquire about the Premier product and if it was different from the (regular) Micro Care contact cleaner, the company to call is Micro Care. They were the ones who (also) supplied Premier (for which Smart Devices used to charge $19.95!) but apparently Premier as a separate product is no longer supplied to the online audiophile outlets. You can contact them here:
http://www.microcareelectronics.com/product-category/contact-cleaners/
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