Vinyl Care

This thread is an excellent case study of what is good and bad about the internet and forums like this one.  As it meanders along the impetus has been perpetuated by a series of excellent questions.  There is a lot of good information, but unfortunately along with it there is a lot of conflicting information that is cause for confusion.  My purpose in adding this note is to try and stabilize the course and minimize the confusion.  I am not the world's foremost authority of vinyl care, Neil Antin is.  Neil Anitin has contributed here and once again I urge anyone who is interested in this subject to download his book.  It is free.  Advice that you might find in this thread that conflicts with his should be considered very carefully.  Ask for the science and the statistical evidence to support any conclusions, procedures or recommendations that seem contrary to the known data as outlined in his writings.  This is an evolving topic, but there is sound science available to support taking reasonable steps to care for your records.  Do no let wild imagination and anecdotal evidence deflect you from what to do.  Do not worry about things that cannot occur such as diamond tracing vinyl producing electrostatic energy.  And heaven forbid you should refrain from washing your dirty records following carefully developed and tested procedures because of the longstanding prejudice of one or two well meaning, but otherwise collectors without documented science to support their conclusions.  There is more than one way to clean a dirty record, but follow the proven scientific methods.

@billstevenson, 

Thank-you for the acknowledgement but let us not forget the contribution that @whart (Bill Hart) made in publishing the book and making it available for free through his site The Vinyl Press -.  

Otherwise, please remember what the book says in the Forward:  All cleaning procedures specified herein are presented as only “a” way to clean a record. No claim is made there is only one way to approach the process. In the final analysis, the best cleaning process is the one that is best for you. All methods/procedures specified here present opportunity for experimenting with different cleaning agents, different cleaning brushes, different drying cloths, and different cleaning equipment.

@faustuss, 

If you are curious, here is the patent for LAST - 1499067499117143667-05389281.  It’s nothing more than a perfluorinated oil dissolved in a perfluorinated solvent.  The fluid is applied, and the solvent evaporates leaving behind an oil film.  However, it does not ’bond’ with the record.  Perfluorinated products are some of the most stable products known, which is why they are now also known as "forever chemicals".  However, there should be no health concerns with using LAST provided you do not drink it.  The oil definitely plates out on the record, and it does not evaporate (perfluorinated oils are used in satellites) and once on the surface, as you have experienced, is not easily removed.  Forget ultrasonics, multiple applications of a fairly aggressive detergent and vigorous brushing are what it takes to remove.  

Neil,

I believe we are in agreement.  My concluding sentence "There is more than one way to clean a dirty record, but follow the proven scientific methods."

With respect to Last I have shared this story on this forum before.  I was working at a high end stereo shop in San Diego when Last was first introduced.  I believe ~1977 or 1978 (?).  Anyway the sales rep demonstrated the product as follows:  We set up two identical Dual 1229 Turntables, on one a fresh copy of Thelma Houston's Direct To Disc was treated with Last; on the the second an identical copy of same was left untreated.  Both were played back and forth to verify that they sounded the same.  This was all done in front of a room full of interested customers.  The two turntables were left on auto-repeat and left to play for one week.  Everyone reconvened and the two were compared again.  The stylus on each was checked and cleaned.  The untreated record had noticeably deteriorated, but the Last treated record sounded fine.  Next it was compared with a third fresh copy of the same record and there was no noticeable difference.  The store sold a lot of Last on that day and ever after.  I still use it on my best records to this day.  

@antinn Yeah, right!

"If you are curious, here is the patent for LAST - 1499067499117143667-05389281.  It’s nothing more than a perfluorinated oil dissolved in a perfluorinated solvent.  The fluid is applied, and the solvent evaporates leaving behind an oil film.  However, it does not ’bond’ with the record.  Perfluorinated products are some of the most stable products known, which is why they are now also known as "forever chemicals".  However, there should be no health concerns with using LAST provided you do not drink it.  The oil definitely plates out on the record, and it does not evaporate (perfluorinated oils are used in satellites) and once on the surface, as you have experienced, is not easily removed.  Forget ultrasonics, multiple applications of a fairly aggressive detergent and vigorous brushing are what it takes to remove. "

 

@richardbrand Just like the ceramic cartridges with the flip-over sapphire stylus with a plastic cantilever you would get on those crappy BSR turntables in the 60s and 70s. Longines Symphonette anyone! 

As for the proprietary stylus geometry, it's just a variation of the length and width of the contact patch. Shibata's and line contacts were developed in the era of quadrophonic because they could resolve the ultra-sonic information encoded on the LP during the lacquering process used to steer the surround effects from speaker to speaker when they were decoded in the preamp. It was also a milestone improvement in faceting the microscopic diamond tip and the resulting advantages in playback quality for stereo LPs.

"Yes, following up on your lead I discovered that the 382 uses the piezo electrostatic effect with a passive network to make it electrically like a moving magnet system.  Another 40-year-old design!  The stylus shape is patented but similar to line contact designs."