Cleaning Vinyl With Distilled Water

I wouldn't make that big of deal out of your cleaning fluid. Weather you are using XYZ cleaning fluid or Tergitol or Triton as your cleaning fluid, I'm sure that all will work about equally as well. You need a detergent and wetting agent. Tergitol and Triton are both of these, as are many other products. The thing about a product like Triton (or Tergitol), is that you are buying something that has what is needed and only what is needed.

When you buy commercial solutions, the companies that are producing and selling them, are making huge profits.

If I buy a gallon of Triton for $35 and I dilute it to make a 10% stock solution, I have ten gallons of stock solution. If I use 4 oz. to every gallon of finished cleaning solution, I am using a concentration of 3% of the stock solution or .3% Triton solution.

Ten gallons of stock solution is 1,280 oz. If I use 4 oz. to make a gallon of my finished product, then I am going to be able to produce 320 gallons of cleaning solution. If I pull out 12 oz. of distilled water from a gallon and add back in 4 oz. of Triton and 8 oz. of 70% alcohol, I have a .3 % Triton and 4.4% alcohol mixture. in my finished cleaning solution.

I am paying no very expensive manufacturer's profit. I am working at basic costs and I have what I need to clean records with.

That, I would not do. I would rinse off the detergent solution before vacuum drying the surface of the record. What ever detergent solution you opt to use, it is important to rinse off the excess solution and then vacuum, air dry or what method you employ.

After washing, I use the sink sprayer to rinse off the excess detergent solution, then I immerse the record into a distilled water final rinse bath. I do this so as to not accumulate the detergent solution in the final rinse bath.

 

Well, I'm admittedly taking sort of a layman's approach to engineering a process that works for me, so I don't think it's a waste of time or effort to run a few comparison tests. I haven't received the Tergital yet, and I still have a surplus of the Disc Doctor solution, so it makes sense to me to compare the results from both of them. After all, that is how I ended up using DD fluid in the first place - after running comparisons with MoFi and the Record Doctor fluid that came with the RCM, it seemed pretty apparent that DD actually made a *huge* difference.

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RE: one vacuum for the wash process, and the second for the rinse process:

Perhaps if I clarify this a bit, it *might* make more sense:

wash > *partially* vacuum on RCM #1 > rinse > *completely* vacuum on RCM #2 > rack dry

I don't have my cleaning station set up near a sink or running water, so there isn't really an easy way to spray or rinse the fluid residue off before actually immersing the record in the rinse tray. BUT... my reasoning for a post-wash *partial* vacuum is simply to remove some of the residual fluid from the record, so I'm not just adding that to my rinse pan.

Based on a couple of comments I've read elsewhere in these forums, including this one:

Disc doctor miracle record cleaner users..

....it seems that some folks have already been experimenting with pre-rinse vacuuming, although it does seem to make sense that one wouldn't want to *completely* dry the record before rinsing, but again, just pull off *some* of the residual fluid, as tim185 mentioned in that that other thread:

 

I've gotten a lot of great ideas from SandandGlass. My homemade solution comes from his suggestions and after applying suggestions from he and others I've pretty much settled on a cleaning routine that works well. Basically I clean in a basin with goat hair brushes, vacuum, rinse and vacuum dry.

I heard a suggestion elsewhere that said to vacuum before doing anything else. Anyone with thoughts on that?

 

Hey there - Well, that's all I was basically talking about doing for my own method, using one vacuum to pull off the majority of the cleaning solution, and then rinsing, and using the second vacuum to dry the record. It seems to make sense to do a little vacuum pass after the wash, so I won't end up putting a bunch of solution in the rinse basin. Sounds like that is what you are doing, yes?

I started out using the Disc Doctor brushes, then after the pads kept coming unglued in the cleaning basin, I switched to the goat hair brushes. Sounds like that's been working for you as well?

Since I still have a reserve of spare pads around, I'm going to try the Disc Doctor brushes again, and do some comparison runs using the DD brushes with DD fluid, and then a few runs with DD brushes and Tergitol. Then I reckon I'll try the same comparisons using the goat hair brushes.

I'm actually noticing a difference using the de-ionized water, compared to the other reverse osmosois water I had been using from a different vendor. It does seem to me that even a little change like that can give huge results. Now I'm just waiting for the Tergitol to get here, so I can run those last comparisons. That way I'll know first hand what the differences might be, and that will help quite a bit, in addition to all the advice I've received from other folks who have experimented with many of these same things.

 

I'll be interested in seeing what your experiments reveal.

I'm not sure I'm following the suggestion some are making about not vacuuming before the rinse. It just seems to me that with the wash going straight to a vacuum will get most of the particles off. I see particles come to the surface of the vinyl that don't make it into the basin. Vacuuming picks this up. I figure if I didn't it might find its way back into the groves. Then when it goes into the rinse basin there is very little trash, and we just rinse off the residual cleaning solution and maybe a few additional particles.

One thing I have observed is that if you wash several times you continue to get some particles off each time. I don't think it is practical to wash over and over and in fact might eventually damage the vinyl, but if you have what might be a valuable record and you have the inclination you might be able to bring it up from a barely VG to almost VG+. I've still got about 2,000 records yet to be cleaned so unless we're talking about a RL mastered Led Zepplin II, and I ain't got one of those, it just becomes a little too obsessive. But I'm retired now so I've got to have something to keep the mind sharp.

 

My record cleaning equipment consist of a natural hair brush that can remove the in-depth dirt from the grooves, rubber gloves to handle the record, hot tap water, quality clothes detergent, a flexible shower head for completely rinse, label protection clamps, a microfiber cloth. Best results. IMHO the vinyl is not so fragile to be damaged after a soft wet and slippery brushing.


I don't use an ultra-expensive and sophisticated audiophile system and whatever "magic" liquids for record cleaning, because I want the in-depth cleaning, not just to polish the surface of the records.

 

What I would be careful about, which is why I use the sink sprayer to rinse off the excess cleaning solution before placing the record in the rinse bath, is not to dry any solution on the record, which might happen with the vacuum

When anything dries, it becomes more difficult to remove, like water spots in the shower glass.

After the wash bath has been rinsed, so that you are not introducing excess detergent into the rinse bath, then when you dry of vacuum, you should be only removing what is mostly pure water from the record, at this point.

 

Tergitol or Triton used as a surfactant/detergent is not going to clean or do anything better than other products, which may contain them or other similar compounds.

The reasons for using them are that it is not so much as to what they contain as what they do not contain.

They are both basic surfactan'st/detergent's, which other companies incorporate into their different cleaning solutions.

Commercial dish soap will clean just as well, maybe better, but it also contains compounds that are designed to clean dirty dishes and cooking pots & pans. The extra's that are are in them are not needed and are not necessarily good for cleaning records.

The concept here is not to make a solution that is the most effective record cleaner, it is to make the most effective solution that you can that will effectively clean records without doing them any harm in the cleaning process and leave residue in the grooves.

Also, you want to achieve this, in a simple and cost effective method.

After you are done cleaning a batch of records, don't throw away the left over wash bath, they using it for cleaning your kitchen counter, sink tiles. Just put some on a dry cloth, wipe and allow to air dry, it will not leave a sticky film like commercial cleaner's will and there will be not perfume smell to the cleaned surface.

You'll understand better why it works for records.

 

Look, there is nothing that is either wrong or counter-productive about me wanting to conduct a few very basic tests, so that I can learn for myself what might be useful, rather than simply taking someone else's word at face value.

As I've stated previously, I compared a few record-cleaning fluids and determined that one actually did provide better results than the others. This was in spite of various claims from others that they were pretty much all the same. Well, as the saying goes, your mileage may vary. Perhaps to some other folks, there is not much of a difference. To me, there was. I've noticed this with different types of water as well.

By the same methodology, it is not going to hurt if I conduct another simple test. It didn't take much to do some cursory research on the properties of Tergitol, and it wasn't much of an investment to add that to my checklist of things to try.

At my age, I'm certainly not jumping into this blindly, and believe me when I say that I research these things much more than one might consider to be with the bounds of sanity or reason (just ask my wife), but there are few things I'm that interested in, and this happens to be one of them. I'm also the kind of person that would rather generally rather create something from scratch rather than just go out and buy a pre-made commodity. That's part of the reason I make lathe-cut records, which I also record, engineer and master in my home studio. The trade-off for the extra work required is rewarded by the personal satisfaction of understanding the details of the process. I think about ten other people on the planet might actually care, but that was never the motivation.

When I've reached a point where I decide to be done with my tests and comparisons, I'm happy to share the boring details and minutia with anyone who may be interested - and that will not make me any more of an expert than anyone else. Everyone is going to have their own criteria for whatever methods they wish to employ, and that's by no means worthy of criticism from anyone. For example, when I was younger, I felt I could not justify the expense of a vacuum record cleaning machine. Now I'm older, and somewhat more financially solvent, and I have two of them. I chose two mid-range models, because in troubleshooting any issue, it hardly makes sense to jump from one extreme point to another; baby steps are often sufficient to at least provide a glimpse. I've seen some fine examples of DIY RCMs, but the price point seemed negotiable. All that said, if someone else finds it more convenient to use Dawn in their kitchen sink and tap water, I can't argue with that, if it works for them.

No one else has to listen to my records, at least not until I'm dead, so until that happens, my little experiments are enough to make me happy, by seeing what I can learn, first hand. I'm certainly not trying to educate anyone - whatever knowledge I may have, along with $2.50, will get me on the bus, assuming the transit company where I live ever steps up their scheduling, that is.

 

All this talk has gotten me itching to get down to the basement and clean some records!!

 

I noticed this at the weekend.. Tiny threads appearing in the grooves!!. I thought 'what the heck?!?' and realised it was the cloth... Not impressed.

 

If you vacuum you shouldn't need to place any cloth on the record, you are removing and drying with the vacuum.

 

My cleaning regiment starts with a spray bottle filled with distilled water and about 10 drops of tergikleen I spray plenty of fluid to the album and use a mobile fidelity wet brush and go several rotations in both directions it then get a warm rinse in the sink I also use label protectors which have a dual function it of course protects the label and makes for a handle to spin the album under the water to rinse then off then it goes into a spin n clean filled only with distilled water after several rotations in both directions it gets towel dried I have found that good quality auto detailing microfiber towels work best and the meguiars that I use work great and don’t shed anything...then they go into a brand new 2.0 diskeeper poly sleeve...I also use disposable latex gloves and do about a dozen or so at a time every album gets this treatment...for really stubborn ones as a last resort I redo them with a scrubbing bubbles treatment I have a old dedicated brush for this step then it gets the regular regiment