It's just distilled water. . . find it at your friendly drugstore or chemical/medical supply store. . . . few cents per gallon. Triply de-ionized simply means that your friendly H2O has been distilled thrice to remove impurities. . . . which may have included some metallic ions, I suppose. . . . but 'triply ionised' sound so much more 'High End' doesn't it? And next they'll call it Triply D-ionized Hydrogen dioxide. . . even more expensive, particularly if also thrice Krioed and filtered through a bed of Tourmaline Granules! G.
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Opus88, I suggest you check out this fantastic thread Finding Pure Water for Record Cleaning for everything you could possibly want to know on this deceptively complex topic. And Guido, as a great admirer of your witty and informative posts, I'm afraid your aqueous expertise is in need of some serious rehydration! Distilled water and deionized water are similar, but definitely NOT the same thing. Perhaps your confusion stems from an error in nomenclature, for when you refer to "Hydrogen dioxide," surely you must mean "Dihydrogen monoxide," the dangers of which are all too well known! Also, your idea of filtering water through a bed of Tourmaline Granules is completely ridiculous: every serious Audiophile knows a jar of Magic Pebbles located anywhere in your ZIP code will work far better! - |
You can find triple deionized water at any local triple deionized water store. It must be then treated quadrupully with a reverse inverted submerged osmosis filter and finally double filtered with a triple stength, quintuple layered, sextupled backed, and septupled multi-bonded piece of cheese cloth. Gruyere of course. Good luck. |
All this is interesting. Bear in mind that I also go to extremes with cleaning at times, but it does raise an observation... We buy old records that someone played for years without cleaning, or if they did, they most likely used a Discwasher brush or washed them in the kitchen sink. Then, to top it all off, we get mad when someone snipes us, and gets the record (sight unseen) for only a hundred bucks. Sometimes we win, though. Whenever that happens, we immediately clean the record with the greatest care, and put it inside a brand new MFSL sleeve. It's a strange hobby that we're in. Still, I'm not changing my rituals just because half my records were played by some guy who used a ten dollar cartridge on a Magnavox console. ;) |
Mosin, Still, I'm not changing my rituals just because half my records were played by some guy who used a ten dollar cartridge on a Magnavox console. ;) It the previous owner didn't damage the LP too much, all that cleaning still pays off. The previous owner of my new (used) car ran it through one of those speedy brush filled automated car washes. Today I got the front end back to factory condition with a bit of TLC, some Zymol and Mothers wax and lots of rags. Hang in there with the LP regime, they may think we're crazy but they can't help noticing how shiny our cars are :^). |
Hi REL and thank you. . . I suchly stand corrected on both counts, although I am not quite sure how Radon gas is related to sound in lps. . . Albert, used a Geiger counter on your lps lately? How I came up with hydrogen dioxide instead of dihydrogen monoxide is anyone's guess. . . perhaps age? My daughter is a Chem. E. . . She'll never forgive me! [grins!] G. |
You can take the "purest" water on the planet and if you store it in glass it will leach minerals from the glass. If you store it in plastic, it will leach plastisizers from the plastic. In both cases it will absorb carbon dioxide from the air, lowering its pH. Having "pure" water when I was a chemistry student in analytical lab was a bitch! Depended on whether you could live with ionic or organic contamenents. If you needed neutral pH that was another matter. Good distilled water should suffice for cleaning records. Going to heroic lengths to purify it seems pointless. |
Opus88, you may want to ask Albert Porter about his experiences with record cleaning fluids. some of the solutions he has worked with lately are astonishingly effective in removing the subtlest particles of ancient schmutz. . . As you may have guessed. . . I am a bleedin' skeptic to start with , but the sonic results I heard at his place last month were not at all subtle. |
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Guess I'm just looking for something that does a good, but not near perfect job of cleaning. I don't particularly care to go through a half-dozen "tender loving care" steps, nor do I want the kind of "rolled off highs" and darkened sound I experienced several years back while sampling some of the popular market brand solutions. I've got some local numbers for what appear to be chemical outlets, and will check out their offerings. Thanks all. |
By far the best groove cleaning machines regardless of water as long as it is distilled once without any other issue and clean works miracles I am referring to the Monks type RCMs. The second best is the sacrifice a cheap cartridge stylus method. Run the record with the no sound on a cheap TT. Use an eliptical cartridge AT makes some cheap ones outfitted with a good "needle". The stylus goes into the groove of course and grabs the schmutz as Corona says. Unfortunately once is not enough. Do it three times, then finish with a velvet brush and any cleaning solution and rinse you have. I am not kidding, you are saying that the record is damaged using this method. I argue not so brother. |
Mechans By far the best groove cleaning machines regardless of water as long as it is distilled once without any other issue and clean works miracles I am referring to the Monks type RCMs. That's what I have, except it's the German version of the Keith Monks http://cgim.audiogon.com/i/vs/i/f/1184571050.jpg This is the rest: Albertporter System What Guidocorona heard was Duke Ellington which had been cleaned once with VPI and two additional times with the machine in the link (above) with Walker and AI. The fourth time, the cleaning that made the "extreme" difference Guido speaks of, is the new Enzyme cleaner from Record Research. I've been using it as a beta sample for a month or two and although it's only (1) wash and (1) rinse (2 steps total-SIMPLE !), it performs better than anything else I've tried. I think they are shipping now and this new stuff is sold under the MoFi trademark at Music Direct. I just got 24 bottles and assume this production run is identical to the Beta. I should know this next week, although Raul is here tomorrow with his new preamp so it will probably be crazy. |
Along with steaming using distilled water and disk doctor miracle solution also using Nerl lab grade water as a double rinse. My vinyl has not sounded better using any of the other cleaning methods i have tried. And thats more than a hand full of solutions and cleaning methods. Though i am always looking and reading more testimonials about new and tried methods. I am beginning to believe that its possible to go over board with vinyl cleaning. The improvements gained are audible but at this time there are getting very small if any. I am most definitely listening to music more than ever and starting to leave the small stuff behind. Though i acknowledge that there always will be improvements in vinyl cleaning and most other things. |
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