Vinyl records now in crisis: Apollo Transco Mastering lacquer plant is a total loss*

I am a cynic. Another scenario: we get DMM pressings for a few years and then record companies try and resell the laquer pressings a few years later as new and improved.

 

I don't think Audiosiege actually cuts lacquers. They do digital mastering and pre-mastering for vinyl, kinda like James Plotkin. I don't see anything on their website about cutting lacquers. That probably explains why most of the stuff they do ends up being pressed at GZ and cut in house there.

United basically sends stuff to Wes Garland at NRP, AFAIK.

 

Wes/NRP are actually on the same premises as United, so NRP is technically United’s in-house mastering, though of course they also have many outside clients

 

I don't wish for the death of a format, but I think that most everyone seems concerned about vinyl production, and that is holding back the sound quality we could have.

Vinyl adds its own characteristics, good or bad. Also, most of the people who are mastering for vinyl and cutting the lacquers aren't the artisans they once were, so that aspect is *usually* inferior.

Many of the bands I listen to press vinyl, and while they offer mp3 downloads occasionally, it's tough to get a digital copy of their music as the only other "format" they are concerned with is streaming. I can't download 16/44 flac, yet alone 24/48 or 96 (I only like hi-res because of better reconstruction filters, not ultrasonics btw). This doesn't even touch upon terrible mastering, and not just dynamic compression, which I actually don't mind, as long as it's tastefully done.

I think we might getting better digital masters if we were to focus less on vinyl production. It's a fun hobby, sure, but I'd rather have a good digital copy. Both can live together, but usually it's one or the other.

 

Whoops, you're right. I was basing it on their Instagram site and didn't realize upon closer look that it was a photo of Adam Gonsalves' studio at Telegraph Mastering. My bad.

 

It shouldn't be a choice, we can have both. I think it takes the artists to care about how their art sounds,
and they'll get it done right. A lot of people just don't seem to care, which is a problem.

 

Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way...

 

I don’t think 4% of the total sales in the music industry is the cause of your problem.

 

So, a blank lacquer disc consists of an aluminum substrate or core which is covered by nitrocellulose lacquer. Apparently the lacquer is applied to the aluminum surface in successive layers to the desired thickness. The solvent used in the lacquer is hazardous, but not excessively so.

I guess I don't see the big engineering feat required here (yes, I'm a PE). The aluminum substrate would need to be of sufficient grade and thickness to ensure a flat surface, but beyond that, I would guess a CNC machine could easily cut the blanks to spec.

The coating would be more tricky, and is likely where the specialized process and machinery comes into play. Just thinking outloud, but I would use a vacuum deposition process like they do when applying corrosion barriers on metallic surfaces. Such a vacuum chamber would not cost a prohibitive amount.

 

E-transfer...I can’t find that app in the App Store! Too bad. I woulda done it too

 

Lots of good new information here. For those who won’t click:

— Most 2020 releases are already set, so disruptions are up to a year away.
— This will indeed hit big labels and artists.
— Talks were ongoing to add lacquer capacity before the fire.

How Will the Fire At Apollo Masters Affect the Local Music Industry?

 

Does anyone know if this company had a fire suppression system?

 

I guess then you don't get all of my record collection and my turntable. Too bad for you.

 

Vinyl Me Please statement:
http://magazine.vinylmeplease.com/magazine/vinyl-apollo-masters-fire/

 

It is so easy to oversimplify when you don't know what is involved (I'm a Chemical Engineer). A blank master disc weighs much more than an LP, and is thicker. The aluminum blank needs to go through the following steps to become a master disk:

1. The disks must be perfectly flat (typically to less than 0.0005"), on both sides. The metal disc needs to be polished to exacting specializations, on both sides. Any imperfections will transfer through the lacquer coating.

2. The aluminum surfaces must then be treated so that they can accept and "become one with" the lacquer coating. I don't know whether Apollo used a vacuum deposition surface treatment, or some more basic surface treatment, but raw aluminum is very reactive.

3. The finished aluminum blanks go through an ultrasonic cleaning to remove any trace residues before being lacquer coated.

4. The lacquer must be applied uniformly to the disks (again, typically to less than 0.0005"). It is applied to both sides, though typically only one side is guaranteed to be free of defects. The other side is, however, often usable, and this may be a way for some needy artists to get some sort of a master made (with a potential hit to quality). The lacquer needs to be thick enough so that even deep cuts never get close to the aluminum substrate. I think the norm is at least 0.007". To provide some perspective, a new car's primer, paint, and clear coat will typically total ~ 0.005". So vacuum deposition, which is great for the thinnest coatings, and is great for coating only one side, is probably not economically feasible for lacquer coating master disks.

5. After the lacquer coating is applied, it must be cured so that the coating is completely uniform, both in presentation and in how it reacts on a lathe. It needs to cut uniformly and consistently from disk to disk.

 

I’d also like to add that Apollo was reportedly doing this all in clean-room conditions. And with all that, were still having difficulty making consistent product… there is obviously something to this that is more difficult than we can comprehend

 

If it's a big label sure. If it's a smaller indie label, maybe not. One label has already said it will affect their 2020 release schedule and many planned releases will be shelved.

 

Is there such a thing as a fire suppression system for nitrocellulose? Once ignited, it can even burn underwater.

 

And yet supposedly one elderly guy in Japan (MDC) is churning out lacquers of much higher quality than Apollo did.

 

Having worked around and in disc mastering since 1975, my estimate would be 100-200 at present. I can think of about 40-50 rooms right now, but I'm sure there are many more I'm not familiar with, or am forgetting.

 

I'm a nuke, so your insight is useful in defining the problem to a greater extent. The extra procedures you mentioned would not seem to add much capital cost, which seems to be the main concern in this thread (viz. the one-of-a-kind equipment, which I haven't seen defined in this thread). I'll discuss your points further below, so as to draw out any further complications and information from those well-informed in this process.

1. The disks must be perfectly flat (typically to less than 0.0005"), on both sides. The metal disc needs to be polished to exacting specializations, on both sides. Any imperfections will transfer through the lacquer coating.

As expected. Apollo was probably purchasing the aluminum blanks, pre-cut, but likely not pre-polished, as they would probably want to control this from a QA/QC perspective. It seems likely they would have used electropolishing, which is not expensive and replacement equipment would be readily available and not overly costly.

2. The aluminum surfaces must then be treated so that they can accept and "become one with" the lacquer coating. I don't know whether Apollo used a vacuum deposition surface treatment, or some more basic surface treatment, but raw aluminum is very reactive.

The primer coat, whatever it may consist of, would likely be applied using the vacuum deposition method as well. So, it sounds like it could be a two-stage process: 1. prime the surface, 2. coat the surface with nitrocellulose lacquer (Japan Black?).

3. The finished aluminum blanks go through an ultrasonic cleaning to remove any trace residues before being lacquer coated.

So they would ultrasonically clean the primed blank? Again, I don't know this process, but I'd like to think that if I have a vacuum chamber set up for deposition, the feed vapor could be sequentially changed such that I do not have to remove the blanks in between the priming process and the coating process; that would seem to be ideal. So what I'd *like* to do is place the electropolished plates in the vacuum chamber, hook up the primer feed to the chamber and apply the primer coat. Once that's done, allow for a settle out period, then hook up the coating feed (nitrocellulose lacquer) and do that application. In this way, there shouldn't be a need to clean the surface, assuming your chamber was clean and your feed stock wasn't contaminated.

4. The lacquer must be applied uniformly to the disks (again, typically to less than 0.0005"). It is applied to both sides, though typically only one side is guaranteed to be free of defects. The other side is, however, often usable, and this may be a way for some needy artists to get some sort of a master made (with a potential hit to quality). The lacquer needs to be thick enough so that even deep cuts never get close to the aluminum substrate. I think the norm is at least 0.007". To provide some perspective, a new car's primer, paint, and clear coat will typically total ~ 0.005". So vacuum deposition, which is great for the thinnest coatings, and is great for coating only one side, is probably not economically feasible for lacquer coating master disks.​

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Not sure what is meant by "deep cuts" here; I thought that this would be a standard depth for inscription onto the lacquer? Secondly, it sounds like you're thinking that vacuum deposition may not be the method Apollo was using. What other method would be used to apply such a relatively thin coat (0.007") with the necessary tolerance (0.0005")? Finally, you mention preparing both sides of the blank lacquer which is surprising to me, but I'll take your word for it. If only one side is typically used, I don't know why you'd go to the expense of preparing both sides, even to a lesser standard.​

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5. After the lacquer coating is applied, it must be cured so that the coating is completely uniform, both in presentation and in how it reacts on a lathe. It needs to cut uniformly and consistently from disk to disk.​

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Makes sense. This isn't adding cost, unless they're curing them in some kind of "oven" or controlled environment. I would guess they did have a clean room for handling the final product, which again isn't that costly to set up, given that it probably wasn't that large. I still say this is doable and not for millions of dollars. The first thing I'd do is move the business out of California, though, due to onerous regulations and taxes. Thanks for your insights!​

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If he hasn't been picked off by the Corona virus

 

Interesting as their releases are highly regarded for sound quality but it seems that they are using DMM on many of them. I wonder how many of their AAA releases are DMM.

 

Zero. AAA DMM itself isn’t impossible, but there are very few releases which would be realistically feasible to cut AAA DMM. The majors will barely even allow their tapes to travel to some parts of the US, let alone outside of it. This is one reason you’ll see some reissue labels work with different studios on different projects. Gotta have a good working relationship with mastering engineers on both coasts.

If the master tapes happen to be somewhere in the UK/Europe, then there might be a chance someone will authorize getting them sent to Abbey Road. The smaller DMM capable facilities are probably out of the question even if they are capable of cutting directly from tape, nobody will sign off on letting them handle their tapes. Not for the albums you want anyway.



The desirability of All-analog DMM seems to be another matter altogether. I don’t think anyone is really clamoring for that, except for maybe Steve Albini.

 

I spent almost 5 years developing advanced coating processes for the semiconductor and related industries. And I was able to use a lot of processes to produce a lot of extremely thin films. My question is how do you expect to vacuum coat nitrocellulose onto anything? I think such an idea is well beyond trivial at any price. It is totally out of the realm of possibility for the volumes and price points of lacquer masters.

Most vacuum coating involves manipulating very stable inorganic materials. The typical methods of vacuum deposition include laser ablation, high energy sputtering, and thermal and chemical vapor deposition. These methods either apply high energy particles to bash a coating source, or high temperatures to effectively volatilize a source material, or to chemically react vaporized materials so that the reaction product of volatiles plates out onto the desired substrate. Adding energy to nitrocellulose will cause violent decomposition. There are no volatile precursors that can be reacted to create nitrocellulose.

Nitrocellulose is a solid, and is only liquefied as a solute within a solvent matrix. You can't melt or vaporize nitrocellulose. The solid is so unstable that once the decomposition reaction begins it is nearly impossible to stop. As a raw material it is so unstable that flammable solvents actually help stabilize it, reducing the likelihood of fire or explosion.

People don't paint houses, or furniture, or cars using vacuum deposition. They apply water, solvent, or oil based solutions or suspensions where the solids eventually cure as the matrix dries. And so it is with nitrocellulose coatings. You'd be surprised how smoothly lower tech coatings can be applied.

As to why both sides are coated, I'll let the experts chime in, but my understanding is that given the nature of the manufacturing process, it is relatively easy to do and doubles the chance that a finished disk will be good enough to ship.