Amazing record cleaning machine for a couple of quid

[Magna Audio]

At the Bristol Hifi show I saw the Keith Monks record cleaning machine in action. Very nice piece of kit but at a price.

So... I decided to make one.



Remembered the old JVC midi TT (£0) in the loft that my father gave me a few years ago - I was never going to play vinyl on it but my daughter is using the music centre tower so we kept it.

Dust it off - stylus fell off Ah good it runs on 12V - dooh it's a belt drive - would have preferred drive. still it runs well and is quite torquey. Keith uses something like 66 rpm but 45 will have to do for me.

Removed the cartridge and drilled a hole in the plastic headshell. Now for a nozzle. A PTFE desoldering pump will do nicely (£0 as I had a spare). Bit of silicone tubing (£2.95 from ebay, nice and flexi). to a jam jar separator tank (£0). Small hole for the lid. I used a rubber grommet super glued in and then the unused end off an silicone sealant squirter as a nice push fit for the tubing.

Big hole for the vacuum tube was cut using a cheaper cutter tool in my pilar drill. Air tight seal was achieved by super gluing a coke bottle top into the flexi tube and then a large 'O' ring around just the screw neck part of the coke bottle screwed up from the inner side of the jam jar lid.

So far so good.
No for the cotton runner thread. Drill a hole in the arm counter weight and find a suitable screw to hole the thread. I am actually using silk thread as it was a bit thicker (£2.90). Make guides for the thread out of zip ties and a paper clip.

Power for the TT - a 12V model battery charger (exact rotational speed not essential).

Now the the cleaning pad and solution. I copped out and bought a clear audio replacement pad for their machines (£9.95).

Cleaning solution. Isopropyl alcohol from an online medical supplier. Distilled water from Halfords and 'Wetting' agent from the local photographic shop.
No nasty detergents / residues for my vinyl babies.
I sent my wife in for the Wetting agent - she had fun asking for that in Jessops ("never heard of it - snigger") the excellent Kodak shop who had heard of it. Cost about £20 to make litres and litres of the stuff.
1/3 IPA, 2/3 distilled water and 0.5 tsp wetting agent.

Here's some pics of it in action.

I've found applying the solution with the record running (having removed the worst of muck with dry pad first). Then letting it run for a minute or so.



Stop the deck and do a back and forth cleaning motion to really loosen the muck, finishing with a run and drawing the pad away.
Mid clean it looks like this.



Then it's spin up the vac (I use a Vax but any vac will do) as long as the big suck tube fits snugly). On with the sucker wand on a new bit of thread each time and away.







I don't (as yet) have a mechanism to smoothly progress the arm across the disc - This is exactly how Keith's machine does it. Leaving it to run in the groove is too slow as the solution dries out fairly fast. I have to manually slowly push the sucker across. The thread protects the grooves. It takes about 5 mins to clean a disc.

Here's a shot of the muck catcher jar.



So does it work? - YES it does. Won't fix scratches but clicks and pops and noise are reduced / eliminated. It really does work far better than washing and trying to dry some other way.

I even use it on new vinyl as it removes the releasing agent used in the pressing and the disc sounds better for it.

So for a few quid and a bit of work - you could have one too.

Every collection should have one.

[Spectral Morn]

Hi Steve

Very interesting you couldn't make the photos bigger say 1024 by 768. I am getting old and I can't make out what your machine looks like

Sorry stupid too the photos are links. However actually embedding them in the post via the IMG code would allow us to see the larger pictures as we read your item...it would make things simpler....just a thought hope you don't mind.


Thanks in advance .....D S D L

[Beechwoods]

Click on em, Neil - on that page you'll see a magnifying glass underneath... click that and they get REALLY big

[Spectral Morn]

D S D L

[Magna Audio]

Fuller size pics now sorted.

[Sgt.Pepper]

Nice attempt their Steve,but for me I'm too lazy to make one,so I just borrow a friends Okki Nokki.
It does have the advantage of using a single record width suction pad,does a fine job on the muckiest of ebay records.
Maybe you could fabricate something like that,its just a tube with some dress felt stuck around the slot ?

[The Grand Wazoo]

Maybe you could fabricate something like that,its just a tube with some dress felt stuck around the slot ?

Maybe he doesn't want to cut up his felt dress...............
.............and he can't use the silk one..........THAT'S SPECIAL!!

[Magna Audio]

There is something rather hypnotic about watching the nozzle suck the groove dry, bit by bit. Better suck per square inch this way I guess too on a home built bit of kit.
However, it is said you don't want too much suck or the downforce on the groove tops could damage them.

Currently leaves the grooves absolutely clear and dry - well as far as I can tell with eye and stylus.

[Beechwoods]

This really is quite fantastic. I would love an RCM but can't afford anything that's half decent. Thanks for sharing the way you've done this... I may try something similar one day...

[Magna Audio]

Cool to share DIY ideas. You will not regret building one for peanuts.
I use it on even new vinyl and it's great to know you can restore any discs as long as they are not scratched or worn out.
A mate of mine came round with some dirty vinyl - that's dirt in the grooves not the content
Cleaned them up and then put them on... He was amazed. There were no clicks and pops and he said he had never heard the between track groove noise so low on them ever. Judy Zuke's Sportscar was one took me back to being a teenager - I always liked the line "I don't care you are, you're not parking your car in my garage"