Original Discwasher Brush Smells of Mildew

Reportedly terrible. The fabric of the new brush is apparently corduroy, and by all accounts is fairly useless at picking up dust. The old brushes, of course had these tiny, soft, directional bristles that were actually designed to get into the grooves. On Amazon.com you can see many, many reviews of people complaining about this. This guy on YouTube does a comparison between the old and new brush.

 

I have a couple of original D4's. I thought the fluid had a touch of alcohol and dried pretty quick so if it has mildew it probably needs to be tossed. It wasn't stored / used properly.

I still use mine as a first clean on really dusty / dirty records to scoop stuff off before I use any enzymatic fluid soak and clean on my RCM.

The RCA "corduroy" product is useless crap and should be avoided at all costs.

 

Bright direct sunlight for a few days can do wonders.
Kills off moldy smell on LP jackets and used books.
U.V. rays have disinfectant properties as well.
Try setting it on a bright window sill.

 

My guess is you've already destroyed it. The reason discwasher brushes work so well isthe way the fibers are laid down in tight flat rows. If you submerge them or soak them or brush them or squeeze them you will ruin them. I own a couple of them and have owned many more over the years and used them in various ways -- over wetting or soaking a brush or squeezing it will destroy it If your brush now shows any fuzziness or nap it's pretty much trashed. On a new discwasher brush all the sleek fibers lay down very flat in A tight row. As they age, the fibers will get fuzzy or stand up. You can still use them to brush a record but they're not working as designed to get into the groove. Lacking the specially angled fibers, the new issue diswasher brushes are lousy because they don't have that very special unobtainium layered material. Disturb that very fine pattern and it's useless --- you might as will be using a crappy carbon fiber brush. When I bought my first carbon fiber brush 20 years ago after using Discwashers my whole life, I immediately recognized the junk that carbon fiber brushed are. I recently sold a sealed disvwasher brush for $110 bucks to somebody who knows they were never bettered. The only other brush that's worth a damn Are some velvet Based brushes. RadioShack sold a cylindrical velvet brush that is actually very good and you can still get dirt cheap on eBay mofi's new brushes are velvet and are very good. But nothing gets in the groove like a discwaher.

 

Well, if that is the case, it was destroyed before I "destroyed" it, so nothing's really lost here. I mean, I wasn't going to use a mildewy brush on my LPs.

Assuming I can eliminate the mildew smell, my plan is to find a dusty record that I don't care much about and try the brush out.

On a another note, if anyone happens to have a non-mildewed, not worn down, not destroyed pre-RCA Dishcwasher brush they want to sell me, let me know.

 

For reference, Crosley sells a clone of the discwasher too. I mentioned the Crosley here somewhere when I first saw it at Barnes and Noble. From my just looking at its brush, it's nothing like a real original discwasher.
Amazon.com: Crosley AC20 Record Cleaning Kit: Home Audio & Theater