How do you rinse?
Another Ultra Sonic Cleaning Test
- Thread starter ear4audio
- Start date
How do you rinse?
Distilled water w a shot of ethyl alcohol in a Spin Clean with the brushes.
To @Fishead 's point, there's debris in the bottom of the Spin Clean tank which means I'm pulling debris off the US cleaned LPs.
I just rinsed around 75 in the same spin clean rinse water with no debris present. Now the US water, that stuff was nasty.
I ran the SC waste water thru a white coffee filter to check for dirt.
I've posted pics previously.
Regardless, if the step doesn't add value to yr process, don't do it.
Doing a batch of records takes long enough w/o adding ineffective steps.
Hi JJ, glad you are perfecting your methods as once you get this all down, I have every reason to believe that you will be very, very pleased with the way your records sound after US cleaning. As mentioned before, some here do not rinse and that's probably because they have perfected a cleaning solution that causes most if not all of the debris in the US tank to sheet off when they remove the records. Most of the reading I've done, however, strongly favors rinsing and I'll point again to Rushton's approach, chronicled by David Robinson here:
https://positive-feedback.com/audio-discourse/rushton-paul-diy-approach-ultrasonic-cleaning-lps/
This should give you a pretty good idea.
I use something very similar to a Vinylbug, see here:
https://recordrecords.org/2019/09/vinylbug-the-vacuum-powered-vinyl-record-cleaning-machine/)
I made my own, use distilled water, a painter's edge pad to distribute the distilled water and run the thing around a few times before vacuuming it off with a mini shop vac that I made a wand for which works really well to get the record dry. Usually only takes me about 2 slow turns and it's bone dry.
I should of taken a pic of my US water, it didn’t need to go thru a filter to look for dirt. They were a lot of very dirty “barn find” vinyls in the bunch. You could not see the bottom of the tank. I was actually surprised how clean the rinse water was after reading some of these US threads.
My LPs had all been Spin Clean & vac before I got into US so the water never got that filthy. Filtered thru a coffee filter tho, you could see there were lots of tiny suspended particles in the US water. I do about 50 LPs in a batch.
Amazing the crap that comes off LPs that had been previously non US cleaned.
Spin Clean & vac works pretty well for what it is tho. Was definitely a step in the right direction.
I had a few used discs so nasty I washed them in the sink before US. Apparently some folks use LPs as coasters & plates (spilled beer & ice cream smears).
yeah mine gets pretty gross too. I've been changing it about every 30 records, which is how many I end up doing per night. Most of my records are similarly sourced too. Right now I'm listening to my copy of Woodstock which was absolutely beat to hell and it sounds pretty decent. I ran this and Woodstock Two through at the same time in fresh water and just those 5 discs put out enough crud to make the water visibly more cloudy and put some sediment in the bottom.
I haven't been rinsing, just letting it dry.
Good article. I'm just exploring what I need to start to USC my LPs. Thinking about this tank, https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07HRF4KJF?ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_product_details&th=1
but don't know which arm/motors I should look at. Would like to do as many LPs as I can fit in that tank, spaced 1" apart.
JJ, most use a tank that is not so deep.....you only need one that is about 6 inches deep. I have one like this:
Amazon.com: PRIBCHO Commercial Ultrasonic Cleaner 6L, Professional Ultrasonic Jewelry Cleaner, 1.6 Gal Stainless Steel Sonic Cavitation Machine, Digital Ultrasonic Cleaner for Denture, Glasses,Watches : Industrial & Scientific
It will let you clean 3 or four records at a time, depending on your turning device. If you desire to do more records, you will need a larger tank but look for one that is wider and still about 6 inches deep. Remember that you need at least one dimension to be about the width of a record, or just a little less like the one shown at 11.75 inches. That's plenty as you will not be submersing the record at the diameter, but rather a bit less as you will not want to get the labels wet. Best to do lots of reading, find out what everyone has been doing, no need to re-invent the wheel although you might make some discoveries to improve upon what is now being used and that is always great, good "audiokarma" indeed!
Amazon.com: PRIBCHO Commercial Ultrasonic Cleaner 6L, Professional Ultrasonic Jewelry Cleaner, 1.6 Gal Stainless Steel Sonic Cavitation Machine, Digital Ultrasonic Cleaner for Denture, Glasses,Watches : Industrial & Scientific
It will let you clean 3 or four records at a time, depending on your turning device. If you desire to do more records, you will need a larger tank but look for one that is wider and still about 6 inches deep. Remember that you need at least one dimension to be about the width of a record, or just a little less like the one shown at 11.75 inches. That's plenty as you will not be submersing the record at the diameter, but rather a bit less as you will not want to get the labels wet. Best to do lots of reading, find out what everyone has been doing, no need to re-invent the wheel although you might make some discoveries to improve upon what is now being used and that is always great, good "audiokarma" indeed!
JJ:
This is the one I recently procured:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B07L3G9TBS?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_image#
It has the spinner and comes with a drying rack.
Personal modifications:
The rotisserie comes with a 24vdc wall wart and turns too fast (in my opinion). I substituted a 12vdc wall wart and now it spins slower (~3.5RPM).
I use 15 drops of Tergikleen in the ultrasonic bath (~1.5Gal.) and rinse the records with pure distilled water after they are removed from the US bath. My personal opinion is that a distilled water "shower" is necessary to remove any residue after the US "bath".
Not sure why you would want one that is that deep, but that's up to you. Remember, you will be filling that thing with a ton of cleaning solution, whichever one you decide to use, and the thing is going to get dirty really quick if you're doing a whole bunch of records at one time. I'm more geared towards doing 3-4 records at a time, 30-40 records per tank of solution before I dump and refill again. You have some choices to make and I'd suggest you get really clear on what you want to do. Have a look at heyraz's setup, this is more like what most of us have done. I think ETLS has put together a system that does 7 or 8 at a time......do a search here and you'll see that as well.
The 15L is nice.
I have the 10L; the 15L has more ultrasonic transducers.
All the units look so similar. I'd bet they all come out of the same factory in China.
Mine is branded Vervor & its worked just fine from day 1.
I've done over 1000 LPs.
Here's my Kirmuss bath water, this morning. Not that bad for 3 months since the last change. I now hand wash every really dirty LP I buy, with Dawn, before using the ultrasonic cleaner. It makes the bath last a whole lot longer and speeds the process.
kyle
Super Member
I've been trying some different temperatures with my US cleaner. 30°C seems to be the most efficient for cleaning. I tried room temp and it a crap job of cleaning. Really no better than a carbon brush. Anything higher than 30°C (I got up to 40°) and I started to feel nervous about the warmth of the vinyl and the cleaning was no better than 30°. I did increases of about 5° at a time.
After 20 or so records I'm really impressed with the cleaning capabilities of US. I rinse then dry with a vac machine after the US bath.
After 20 or so records I'm really impressed with the cleaning capabilities of US. I rinse then dry with a vac machine after the US bath.
Hey Booch, what is in your cleaning formula? If you are using any IPA in there, I'm thinking I remember something about that gassing out after a fairly short period of time, but am not 100% sure.....do you remember anything like that? I try not to leave mine in the tank for more than a few days. When I was cleaning 25-30 albums a day, it was necessary to change out daily anyhow, but now that I'm only cleaning occasionally the time in between is more drawn out. So, if somebody knows about the IPA concentration diminishing over time, please chime in.
Kyle, this may again be dependent on the particular solution we are using, but I found mid-30s C. to be the sweet spot. Have cleaned all the way up to 42deg. C. without any harm to the records but like you, it just plain made me nervous. Also, BE SURE you have a trusted thermometer, one that has been tested for accuracy to within a couple degrees, on hand to check what your tank is reading. I found my tank to not be all that reliable although at times it is spot-on. Not sure why this is, could be ambient room temperature, the spot in the tank where the built-in thermometer is mounted etc. etc. who the heck knows. I always double-check with my multimeter that has a probe and I believe to be spot on. Even with that, I can get variances of a couple degrees depending on where in the tank I take the reading.....just sayin'......
Kyle, this may again be dependent on the particular solution we are using, but I found mid-30s C. to be the sweet spot. Have cleaned all the way up to 42deg. C. without any harm to the records but like you, it just plain made me nervous. Also, BE SURE you have a trusted thermometer, one that has been tested for accuracy to within a couple degrees, on hand to check what your tank is reading. I found my tank to not be all that reliable although at times it is spot-on. Not sure why this is, could be ambient room temperature, the spot in the tank where the built-in thermometer is mounted etc. etc. who the heck knows. I always double-check with my multimeter that has a probe and I believe to be spot on. Even with that, I can get variances of a couple degrees depending on where in the tank I take the reading.....just sayin'......
I set mine to 40C, but it only seems able to maintain about 30C with the lid off in my ~50F workshop where its living. I was half considering getting some of those hollow plastic balls that lab water baths use to control heat loss but I don't want one getting trapped against a record and causing damage.
Initially mine was way off temperature. I checked the tank after just letting it sit for a while and found it was 60C when set to 40. The temperature probe wasn't stuck to the tank so it wasn't actually sampling anything. Now with it set to 40C, it runs 40-42C which seems reasonable enough for a mechanical thermostat.
I made a 1/2 cover & that helps maintain temp in the high 30's.
I got warping in the mid 40's but the discs flattened right out when cooled - no harm done.
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