I recently bought a record collection from a friend. They were pretty filthy. His pet rabbit had eaten most of the sleeves and the records themselves were covered in grime. That being said, they were a great selection of tracks, so I spent a little time reading up on the infinite ways people (some of them clearly lunatics) clean and restore vinyl. Needless to say, it was a rabbit hole in itself. Like with most things in the world of audio, there are homebrew solutions that will cost practically nothing, right up to hardware that will set you back many thousands of pounds.
I - Washing Up Liquid
Now, I’m not interested in losing desk space to a big, noisy, professional ultrasonic record cleaner. Nor am I enamoured with the £1k+ price tag a decent model sells for. Therefore, I decided to head down the DIY route to see what results I could achieve with a ghetto setup.
The records were so dirty that I didn’t want to risk simply rubbing them with a vinyl cleaning spray. I’d have run the risk of rubbing grit and other debris into the grooves and causing further scratches. I figured that I’d simply wash them in the sink.
Equipment used:
Normal water. Tepid temperature.
(I do have a water softener fitted, but it’s not distilled or anything fancy)Fairy Washing Up Liquid
Microfiber cloth
Plastic washing up bowl
Drying up rack
You can buy fancy label protectors for washing vinyl. But I simply ensured the water didn’t cover the label when the record was submerged vertically in the bowl. I rotated the records in the water whilst very gently rubbing the surface anti-clockwise with a microfiber cloth. This is (kind of) a ghetto version of what a professional record cleaner does anyway.
Once I was certain the worst of the grime had been transferred into the water, I placed the vinyl on a soft towel and scrubbed forcefully anti-clockwise moving towards the edge of the vinyl. The records were finally left to dry naturally on the drying rack. The end result was great. The records looked super clean when held to the light. There was some slight residue visible from the water droplets. I suspect this is a result of not using distilled water.
As a final stage, I re-cleaned the records with a fresh (dry) microfiber cloth and a vinyl cleaning spray. I honestly can’t say I’ve found much difference between the sprays. I’ve used a range of them now, and they all seem to do a similar job. They generally contain Isopropyl alcohol and sometimes other chemicals. You can buy the raw ingredients and make your own relatively cheaply if this sort of Breaking Bad chemistry excites you. Anyway, this final clean seemed to remove the minor residue and generally left the vinyl looking nice and shiny.
Finally, I always rehouse records in new sleeves. There’s no point storing a clean record in an old sleeve full of grit. Furthermore, in the past I’ve made the mistake of buying collections that must have been stored in damp conditions. Unbeknownst to myself, the sleeves had mould which later spread!
II - Audiophile Gel
Now, I was content to stop here. The process had been fast, cheap, easy and had led to great results. I didn’t need to do a before and after audio comparison test. Originally, I’d have been terrified of letting these records anywhere near my decks. By the end, most of them played fine, and any imperfections were obvious scratches or storage scuffs. I was pretty certain that throwing money at the problem wouldn’t transform these well used records any further.
Nevertheless, I had my nagging doubts. Why were there pages of super expensive products, if spending a few quid on microfiber cloths, washing up liquid and isopropyl spray would do the job?
As such, I read about various gel based solutions. The basic premise is to spread a specially designed fluid or gel over the record’s surface, leave it to dry, before finally peeling it off as a film. It’s effectively a professional version of the PVA wood glue approach. Removing the dried film should yank most remaining contaminants out of the grooves. Anecdotal reports were positive - some claiming it to be better than ultrasonic record cleaners!
I found an equivalent in the UK called Winyl Cleaning Gel. It costs £20 for 500ml of gel and this quantity will clean approximately 30 x 12” sides (or 15 records). So in summary, each fully cleaned record sets you back £1.33. Not cheap, but certainly better value than a high-end ultrasonic cleaner, unless you plan to clean hundreds, if not thousands, of records.
For this test, I deliberately selected two records that hadn’t cleaned up well with my ghetto approach. I was almost certain this was due to permanent groove wear and scratches and sceptical better results could be achieved. The first target was a green coloured 10” single. Coloured vinyl of this era generally suffers from more surface noise, and this particular single had lived a tough life. As such, I caked it in gel and left it to dry.
Despite leaving the gel for a full 8 hours (recommended drying time is 5 to 7 hours), at an appropriate temperature and using the recommended quantity, one small section was still slightly damp on removal. Drat! Easy to remove, but clearly I needed to leave things drying overnight in the future.
The results were… disappointing to say the least. I recorded the quieter sections of the vinyl before and after treatment. Can you hear any difference? I certainly can’t.1 And viewing the waveforms in an editor doesn’t reveal anything noticeable either.
Growing increasingly concerned that I’d donated £20 to an audiophile conspiracy, I selected a different EP that was quite battered - Remarc’s mighty Help Me. My copy looks like it’s been stored sleeveless for some of its life - it’s covered in scuffs and light marks. Again, I chose to record a quieter section, where one track finished and another started. Here, surface noise, pops and crackles were most prominent.
Before (Ghetto Cleaning Only):
After (Additional Clean With Gel):
This time around, for whatever reason, the results were more impressive. If you compare the waveforms below, a large amount of surface noise has almost vanished after treatment! I had presumed these were permanent defects. Fantastic stuff. I have no hypothesis as to why it worked better on this particular record, but it did.
That being said, the vast majority of records I ‘ghetto cleaned’ ended up in a far better state than these two to begin with. To the point where I wouldn’t choose to wait 8 hours+ and waste £1.33 to clean them any further.
So, would I recommend this gel? I’d say it’s worth a punt if you have a small number of valuable records that you hope can be improved further. But I can’t say the faff and expense of applying it would encourage me to use it on anything other than the most extreme cases. Some might argue the final result is negligible, and as a record collector you’d be better off sourcing a superior copy to begin with.
And there we have it. Feel free to share your own weird and wonderful solutions in the comments below - please subscribe and happy scrubbing!
The bottom audio file here is the version treated with gel.