KNOSTI Record Cleaner

[Greg.]

Hi Paul,

Very good point. As a professional diver I used to use ultrasonic baths for cleaning stripped down SCUBA. It did a perfect job regardless of how crudded up the valves were. I'm sure there are baths available that would be big enough for an LP and the system could be easily adapted. I'm out of touch now so not sure what it would cost, but I bet it's less than some of the expensive purpose built record cleaners available.

Best wishes,

Greg

[Paul Barker]

Hopefully someone will bother. The one linked here could possibly be adapted, you buy these ultrasonic transducers off eBay slap them on the side, but would take 2 minutes or longer for every bit of the record, so you might need 6 minutes to clean a record that way. I believe it is probably the least invasive most effective method.

I have a small ultrasonic bath the size of a bread maker for cleaning pilot jets and the like without boaring the hole out, so no more pulling out a hair of a wire brush and ramming that in the jet. I can't fit my records in it deep enough, needs purpose made bath, record is an odd shape.

I could do cd's in mine but haven't a cd spinner.

Wasn't in the slightest tempted to buy one lately either.

[andrew ivimey]

ummm, we use an ultrasonic bath for cleaning hearing aids which, interestingly enough, doesn't damage the electronics nor the microphone, the latter is guaranteed to fail if you put a hearing aid in the washing machine!
- wonder why.

I could put a CD in ultrasonic bath but don't have one that is dirty and it seems silly to coat a CD with marmalade as an experiment when I could as well eat it for breakfast.

okki-nokki sucks but doesn't if you know what I mean !!! I like it.

[John7]

You can't beat a vacuum record cleaner and Disc Doctor fluid in my opinion. L'Art du Son fluid (Loricraft) comes a close second.

And replace your inner-sleeves too!

John

[Stratmangler]

On the ultrasonics front, haven't Guinness just had an ultrasonic agitator thing they pushed in a promotional campaign ?

I think they used it to create a lovely head on your pint.

Do you think it might work with a Knosti bath ?

Chris

[pre65]

Hi-looking on e-bay for ultrasonic cleaners they are all too small !

now i have never seen one but those of you that use them could tell me how they are made up.

for example is the ultrasonic "bit" inside the tank and do you think it (or they) could be rehoused in a bigger container ?

Philip

[Cobblers]

I have the knosti it is not in the same league as a proper cleaning machine with vacuum suction (my pa bought one of these and rarely ever uses it)

It is still well worth having, but can leave a little invisible crud (when on the record) which collects on the stylus and sometimes has to be carefully cleaned off the stylus after listening to one played side (so maybe not for lovers of high end MC carts!).
This happens less so when the records are left longer to dry, but does this mean the remaining crud/residue is simply drying to the disc?

The Knosti does a fair job, but is overpriced at £40+

I haven't used the proper Knosti fluid, but looking at the colour of my homebrew fluid after it had cleaned 50 or so records showed that it was removing a lot of dirt.

Running the records through a rinsing step is a good idea, deionised water and wetting agent are cheap enough. I'm happy with a few hours drying time, I just wish that the little drying rack held more than eight records though!

[andrew ivimey]

Ah, '...drying rack...' is a clue. Is the Knosti like the Disco anti something or other for about £40? We have talked about this before, a while ago.

I have used disco anti stat to get things washing and then whipped the LP out of the bath and given it a sound sucking on an ookki nokki, and then let it dry a while.

Discoantisomething was astonishingly good for LPs that look like breakfast had been eaten off them, less so with cleaner better condtion LPs.

On the whole, if I were not so lazy, I would use both as a process. I have too many LPs though. Okki nokki has been a little disappointing with nearly very clean LPs.

And yes, new inner sleeves are more than sensible.

Andrew - yes, the same Disco thing.

For new inner sleeves 'British Audio' are doing a very good deal at the moment, 75 nice inner sleeves for £10 including postage:
Nagoaka style.