Ultrasonic Record Cleaning
I’ve had very good results with my inexpensive vevor. Quite a few of my inherited albums were stored in a garage with a leaky roof. So, I have quite a few that have mold visible on the vinyl. I used to hand scrub the mold with a microfiber cloth and soapy water. It got them playable, but not great and it was a lot of time consuming work. Now I just give them a quick wipe with 25% iso, scrubbing a little more on visible mold, then sonicate for 25 minutes. I’ve done 8 moldy records and got 7 of them playable with minimal effort. The one that didn’t work out had signs of rough handling and I didn’t expect much. Some even had paper sleeve material melted and married to the grooves. Two of the successful rescued disks have a little more noise than I like. While they’re playable and enjoyable, I’ve set them aside for a 2nd dip (once I have two more recovered mold monkeys so I can run a full batch of four).
For normal records, not moldy, I’m running distilled water and 15 drops of Tergikleen, 15 minutes at 30 degrees C. 4 records per run. I just let them air dry overnight. Results are amazing. The only water spots I’ve seen were on the glossy dead wax, where they are very easy to spot.
For my rinsing process, I use a Zep spray bottle with distilled water. I go around the record once, turn it 180 degrees and rinse again. Then I flip it over and repeat on the other side.
I’m planning to modify my rinsing process. Do as above, then flip back to the first side I rinse and give it another lap. Then flip it again and do another lap on the other side.
It might be overkill, but the amount of distilled water used in my rinse process is not expensive. Especially not expensive compared to replacing an album.
Highly recommended for anyone with more than a few hundred records (vevor or other brand). I have a couple thousand. Running the USC just when I have time on the weekends is producing more cleaned records than I can listen to in a week.
Of course once cleaned, you want to place them in inner sleeves that don’t generate static electricity or scratch the disks. I’m using Hudson HiFi brand. Good quality and not too expensive.
Edit: added rinse process.
Edit edit: IMHO the vevor rotisserie motor runs way too fast. I run the rotisserie motor at around 3 VDC to get around 1 RPM. A cheap variable output transformer/power supply from amazon does the trick.