Well, my ritual is not unsimilar to Ken's. Every LP side, before being played, is put on the VPI HW 16, dusted off with a Hunt EDA brush and then given a good washing. After that, the surface is treated by a concoction made up of trifluortrichlorethane and molybdensulphate and when on the player, dusted off again. The stylus is cleaned and then I let her rip. (Even with pristine record surfaces you will get a better soundstage in width and depth as well as much more minute information from the groves after this treatment. That's why I do this ritual every time.) Cheers |
Sure, Kubla, but who cares and besides show me another psychopathology with so much fun-potential which is on the safe side of the law. Generally, as Orson Welles used to say, all the good things in life are either illegal, immoral or fattening. Cheers again! |
Lithium impairs hearing acuity Greg, and should only be applied when we go repeatedly on buying sprees and are spending more than we can afford. The mix is about 2% of the molly to the rest of the stuff and I use it with a felt brush on which I apply appropriate amounts of the liquid with the help of a pipette. The trifluor stuff is actually what the Last record preservative used to be made of and the molybden idea came from a product called scratchfixer....and thanks Rockvirgo, I'll add the nose part to my ritual. Cheers, |
Frap, you are quite right: Also my concoction leaves a certain sound signature....only I like it...hence no afterward rinsing. Besides, when I still used to rinse, I must have done something wrong, because even three times destilled H2O caused the record to crackle and pop more than it had in an unrinsed state. Could never explain that, so I gave up that part of my usual ritual cleansing. Regards, |
Albert, could you please give me a source for the RR fluid. That would be very kind. Frap, thanks for your suggestion, but its not the drying process, its the bad quality of triple destilled water, which caused the trouble. Albert is quite right there. Besides, I don't think we are compulsion neurotics, rather we are acting in a perfectly rational fashion, because our procedures, different as they may be in detail, do indeed serve succesfully to improve the sound of LP-playback. (Worrysome thought: Don't they say, that the truly crazy always think themselves perfectly sane?)Last thought: So what, main thing it serves the music. Cheers to all in this great thread! |
Wow, Albert! Thankyou!!! I wished I had so much kindness in my instincts as well ! Cheers, |
Oh heck, those typos. I have to wait, not to war, ain't a freebootin' poirate, Oi ain't , rahter just patiently waiting. Longplate....I suppose all views from the inside of what will you, are probably disillusioning. I'm a linnetik-heretic too, though I think Tiefenbrun was the first to show, that turntables matter, wasn't he? |
Thanks Albert, will report here as soon as I have tried it out.
A propos rituals: I just rememembered, that the great Enid Lumley before playing an LP( wonder what happened to her, she was thought nuts in the seventies for propagating tweaks, which are common knowledge now ) used to rotate the LP or her Mapleshade to a specific position to place the stylus on. A position she had found out to give the best sound. |
You forgot to mention your EEG, Plasmatronic , which will monitor the state of your Delta brain waves, in order to tell you when, through careful breathing exercises, you have brought yourself into the right meditative state to be receptive for a musical offering. |
Doug, do you use them in the treadmill to power your recordplayer? Regards, |
Hi Doug, yes I wondered about the instability, but thought you had perhaps a special training program. Regards, |
As you have read, Albert Porter has had the generosity and kindness to ship a bottle of the RR Cleaner together with a sample of the stylus cleaning fluid out to me. The parcel arrived two day ago. When it arrived, I happened to have a live recording of a big band (Buddy Rich, haven't got the label and number here at present)on the platter, which I had previously treated with my ritual plus concoction, as described above. The recording has a nice soundstage, both in depth and width, Rich's drumset has tremendous kick and sparkle, the double base is quite well rendered, the piano a bit too laid back, but the horns and reeds up front alive and vibrant. Even the audience is fairly well caught up, the ambience very alive. So it was a good record with plenty of parameters for trying to find out if anything would be different. My personal attitude was sceptical: I wondered if I would be able to hear any difference at all, even if there were one, which I also was sceptical about.
I first listened to the first two cuts on side one in its original state. Performances, I know very well. I then treated this side of the lp with the RR stuff, cleansed with my usual Nitty-Gritty fluid on the VPI afterwards, cleaned the stylus with RR and then let her rip, playing the whole side through. The same procedure then with the other side, as in side one.
My preliminary findings:
With the RR treatment the tiniest gauzelike veil seemed removed from the performance, something I had not realised was there before. This was consistent through both sides.
I use plasma tweeters - no material is moved here - just a flame - so my highs are impeccably fast, extended and pure and I never thought, they could be bettered in any way. Well it seemed, that after RR treatment just the tiniest of grain was removed here. One instant was especially remarkable: There is suddenly a very high pitched whistle from the audience to be heard, which after RR treatment hurt a bit in the ear, something it never had done before. ( I had not fiddled with the volume controls of course, nor changed anything ) That left me flabberghasted. The soundstage did not change, the soundspace was a bit more vibrant, the piano was bit less recessed, reeds and horns a tad "closer" as before.Perhaps there was more dynamics to the drum, but I cannot be sure. The only negative thing: The double base seemed just a tiny bit muddy suddenly and I suppose it was something which was masked before and I had not noticed this so clearly. Otherwise the boundaries of the instruments seemed to be drawn by a bit sharper pencil, if you like, as before, however not interfering with the bloom of them. The differences described are in no way large, but clearly to be noticed and to my ears clearly to the better. I think the stuff could make good recordings bloom, but also make bad ones ( especially in the violins ) sound worse.
Of course I still cannot be completely sure of the suggestibility factor----so more experimentation is needed.
But for the moment, I think this stuff beats all I know and have tried. The next step is to experiment with classical music,soprano voices, solo piano and solo string instruments. If you are interested, I'll keep you posted.
Incidentally, in the latest edition of TAS there is the letter of a reader, describing how much better LP's would sound unwashed in any way, painstakingly describing the differences. Goes to show, how different out tastes, experiences, ears and last not least our rigs are.
THANKYOU ALBERT FOR YOUR KINDNESS, Regards, |
Doug, I know about this, so I only played the first two cuts on each side in its original state until I applied the RR treatment, cleaned and vacuumed. After treatment I played the entire side. The muddyness of the bass stayed on, so it was not because of the effect you had mentioned.
Regards |
Blues man, I've had the same trouble with aqua dest as you mention, even with ion exchanged water, so I've stopped using it a long time ago. Up to now, I've used the Nitty Gritty machine solution. Have now, thanks to ALBERT's suggestion ordered some RR Vinyl Wash and yes Albert, I'll report again, as soon as it has arrived and I've tried it.
Cheers to all, |
Well Longplate, if I had only known....Alas, I've got a toploader. |
Yes, p l e a s e , I'm with Kubla, let us know and Greg, LOL, I do love your mind ! By the way, I'm busy trying out Albert's RR solution, comparing it to my mixture. I still have to war for the RR record washing solution to get a really clear picture. |
Life IS difficult and that of an audiophile often more!
Why you may ask? Well, thanks to the Albert's kindness I was happily testing the RR unctions and found them to be really convincing in giving a better soundstage both in width and depth and a beter clarity of the overall sound.... until, well, until I struck upon an old, old Louis Armstrong Stereo LP at a garage sale, eagerly took it home and played the first side, just after brushing it off a bit. I fell into a state of bliss, as I heard the old trumpet-genius's voice rasping away between the speakers, savouring the brilliance of the horns, the tapping of feet, the backstage murmurings. Then I gave side two the RR treatment and truly the magic was gone. The voice lost its bite, the contours of it were truly washed out ( pun intended), the soundstage though bigger, was much less precise in the delineation of instruments. A sad disappointment. So what is the explanation ? I don't know.
It may be, that side one and side two were mastered differently, though I doubt that. Perhaps its a question of the vinyl. As I said, it was a very early stereo LP. Has anybody got an explanation? Anyway, I generally have found, that cleaning Lps thoroughly before playing is beneficial to its rendering along several important parameters. This is the first time, that I was forced to realise, that this is obviously not always the case. Maybe those guys who maintain, that washing Lp's is detrimental to the sound, are not as tinnyeared of preculiar as I was tempted to assume.
Regards,
|
Albert, thankyou for your excellent reasoning and your extraordinary experience, which you so openly share with us. Much food for thought indeed! Yes, I'll keep on experimenting and will post it here in due course.
Warm regards to all! |
Well, I've been busy experimenting and my new findings are still not carved in stone but here goes: The RR treatment seems excellent for large orchestral works such as RCA shaded dogs with Reiner and the Chicago Philharmonics. There is not only a noticeable difference in width and depth of soundstage between treated and untreated sides of the same LP, but the overall sound seems richer and more lush. Strings and horns especially just seem to have more bloom. A contrary experience was with an old Verve Stereo with Ella Fitzgerald, "Clap hands here comes Charlie", which I had newly bought and where my findings were quite similar to the old Satchmo LP I had written about before. The one side, which I had treated, sounded fine, but there was no real definition of the soundspace of the accompanying instruments. Ella's voice and the rest of the band seemed to be on just one horizontal plane. There was no depth to write home about. The untreated side, though generally more dry in its rendering, showed definite layering of the different instruments, with Ella firmly placed in her own soundspace. The rendering was less lush, but in a sense more realistic with the various instruments playing around her. Also her voice was better definied, much like Armstrongs'voice seemed better to me untreated. So I am still puzzled and will keep on trying to find out if its all in the mind or if there is a reasonable basis to my findings.
Cheers to all, |
Sean, I just cannot give you a definite answer. I've tried a lot, incl. homebrew and I am more than confused. They all do something to the sound, but according to my ears, the results are anything but uniform. Some lps seem to improve, some not, even seem to get get worse. I like the RRL with classical music, but sometimes only after a retreatment with my concotion of trifluor-trichlorethane and molybden-liquid,(ex sctratch fixer) but then again, sometimes it seems to screw up the soundstage. I don't know NG, never tried Disc Doctor, but VPI is waiting on the shelve and next on my list. Sorry to be of no help. |
Zaike, old mate, not a chance. You've been hooked long ago and you know it....
Postscriptum: Does your lady perchance have an elder sister? |
To wit, dear Zaike, 'tis not the unctions which do tell on you, 'tis cartridge-tonearm settings which forsooth betrayeth you as hooked through and through.... |
By Jove, me thought, thou didst protest too much, but now sweet truth is flowing from your lips as honeydew in spring. A pox on all, who forthwith doubt your words. |
After an evening of listening, I'd like to come back to this thread. I still find, that some LPs profit immensely by my cleansing procedure described above both in sound stage and frequency expansion and some simply do not and sound washed out with pun certainly intended. I still do not know, why this is so, but I suspect it must be the vinyl, because those that do not profit, but actually lose in presence and directness are mostly very early stereo LPs. In spite of that, even with records of the late fifties early sixties the ratio of cleansing profit and cleansing detriment is still 4 to 1 in favour of definite improvement. Again, I find though, that in our hobby there are few definite answers and my suspicion of those who have found absolute thruth ( or absolute sound ) has certainly not diminished. To the contrary, it is fun to experiment and to discover..... Cheers, |
