Degritter ultrasonic record cleaner

Hi y’all, just a few words on what I think is a worthy alternative to the Audio Desk Systeme and KLAudio ultrasonic cleaners.

http://degritter.com/media-kit/

I’ve been a beta tester on the Degritter for the last few weeks, and am happy to offer my opinions and answer any qs for those interested.

I believe official launch is in early May, and at this stage after a couple of quibbles in day to day use, I’m planning to keep my unit, it’s been a pretty good success, and invaluable addition to day to day life as a vinyl addict.

 

Agreed, that sounds like a pretty good number of machines. Fingers crossed all the main issues are solved. I'm also curious when we might see pro reviews of the Degritter. If the performance is competative with the Audio Desk etc, I'd think it would be the go-to US record cleaner.

My tracking says it's out for delivery to my house now.

 

Righto.

So my Degritter arrived yesterday. Very well and thoughtfully packed. Came with some "gifts" as it were - as other owners will find. That was a nice touch.

Looks nice, just like the pictures. Seems solid enough. I really like the aesthetics. I had one "uh-oh" moment. The slot where the records sit has a rubber lining. Something must have shifted in transport because one half of the rubber lining seemed loose, so the rubber slot narrowed precipitously towards one side. It would rub against records during cleaning if it stayed that way. I thought the rubber was held on by adhesive and that the adhesive must have come loose for one half of the rubber. On emailing Taniel, who got back to me quickly, it turns out the rubber is not adhered to the rim of the record slot, but affixes itself by ridges along the sides near both ends of the slot. The rubber is made to be easily taken off if the user wants to wash the US tank. Once I lifted the rubber up more to see how it went on to the rim, I was able to affix it back on and it seems to be staying. So...good to go. (I thought I'd mention this in case any owner experiences the same shifting of that rubber lining).

I filled the tank and used a couple ml of the cleaning fluid to try washing my first record. (I have not had time to actually listen to the results btw, I was just getting the machine up and running, checking everything worked). I chose the "Medium" setting, which is supposed to be 3 minutes wash, 2 minutes drying time.

All the cycles, including the ultrasonic washing cycle, are quite quiet and not remotely annoying, which was really nice to experience!
The fan when drying, which was set at it's default halfway power point of "10" was fairly loud. Not as loud as some other RCs I've heard - e.g. VPI and others. But loud enough to be pretty intrusive if one was trying to place this where other people might be hanging out. It's therefore really good that Degritter offers the option of changing the fan power to lower the volume. In playing with the fan settings, the volume/power of the fan can be raised considerably, and lowered a lot too.

Speaking of the fan settings, a feature I'd like to see is an automatic compensation for extending the drying time. In other words, if I have found that a drying time of 2:30 gets records dry, if I lower the fan setting the drying time will need to be extended. At this time, as far as I can tell, if you lower the fan power it's up to the user to experiment and find out what new drying time is appropriate with the new lower fan power setting.
I'd think that some sort of calculation would be possible, whereby the brain of the machine calculates how much longer drying time is needed for the record to be dried, and sets it accordingly. Even better would be to see such a calculation happening on the dry-time adjustment screen.

Anyway, I'm sure once the user has done his experimentation, some fairly permanent combination settings will be decided upon.

I used a record that I remembered to be quite noisy when I got it. It has lots of visual scratches, scuff and maybe "crud" on the vinyl.
The Medium cycle did it's thing, but the record came out still quite wet. It turned out that for some reason the default dry time for all the cycles had been set to 1 minute, which isn't enough to dry a record. I don't know why that default dry time was chosen on my machine, and the user manual pictures shows a default drying time of 2 minutes which makes more sense. So I dried it again. And fortunately the Degritter is very easy to dial in, so I simply chose a longer drying time, which automatically applied to all the washing settings. I expect no more issues with wet records. The flexibility and user friendliness of the Degritter is great.

The record came out looking obviously cleaner, though with quite a bit of the surface marks still there. I washed it again and it at least *seemed* to me the record looked even cleaner, though still with a number of surface marks left on. I therefore presume that what is left on the surface is actual record damage - e.g. scuff marks - rather than some sort of crap the Degritter did not remove.

So that's it after just receiving the machine and with one record used to test how it works.

Once I learn my way around this thing, it promises to be what I hoped for.

Once I start comparing the sonics of before/after cleaning, I'll report on that.

 

I’ve settled on 5 mins “heavy” clean, and 2 mins 30 dry.

Hi Spirit.

I'm just trying to dial in my Degritter settings.

Your post suggests that the cleaning cycle can be set manually by the user to whatever desired time. Was that true of the beta version?

On my machine, and looking at the user manual, I see no option to play with wash cycle times. There is only the option of quick, medium, heavy - which tops out at 3 minutes 45 seconds wash time.

 

COF, just caught yr q. No, the beta and production versions are identical in this respect. I've only found a few lps that have needed repeats. I tend to go for the longest clean/dry setting. I'm only cleaning a max of 5 lps a day, so no great sacrifice.

 

COF, just caught yr q. No, the beta and production versions are identical in this respect. I've only found a few lps that have needed repeats. I tend to go for the longest clean/dry setting. I'm only cleaning a max of 5 lps a day, so no great sacrifice.

Oh, ok. It sounded like you were using a 5 minute wash time for every LP. So if I understand, for a longer wash you just do another wash/dry cycle.

 

That's absolutely right. I'm gonna wait until the initial pressure on Degritter dies down before returning my beta unit for full production one.

 

Mine arrived this week and I've found that drying time is record dependent. I had an older record that came out of the wash cycle drenched, and this took 6 minutes on 12 to fully dry. Other records come out of the wash cycle hardly looking wet at all. These dry in under 3 minutes on 10.

Overall, so far so good. Many more records to go.

 

Yeah, although the default drying times seem to be 2 minutes I found I had to dial up to 4 minutes to make sure the records were fully dry. (Fan power at 10).

 

How is everyone getting along with their Degritter?

Mine seems generally reliable, though it does not automatically shut off after 15 minutes as it is supposed to. I don't know if anyone experienced that, but Degritter says they have a software update that fixes that issue and also makes the user experience better.

I'm still experimenting as to whether I want to use the surfactant or not.

BTW, two US record cleaner manufacturers, Kirmuss and Degritter, are having a back-and-forth "discussion" in the comments section defending their respective designs, on Michael Fremer's Analog Corner. Lots of interesting technical claims from each side. (I have to say Degritter's responses are clear and concise, where Mr. Kirmuss' prose leaves me with a roaring headache).

If interested, the discussion is occurring here:

https://www.analogplanet.com/content/axpona-2019-turntable-round#comments

 

How is everyone getting along with their Degritter?

Mine seems generally reliable, though it does not automatically shut off after 15 minutes as it is supposed to. I don't know if anyone experienced that, but Degritter says they have a software update that fixes that issue and also makes the user experience better.

I'm still experimenting as to whether I want to use the surfactant or not.

BTW, two US record cleaner manufacturers, Kirmuss and Degritter, are having a back-and-forth "discussion" in the comments section defending their respective designs, on Michael Fremer's Analog Corner. Lots of interesting technical claims from each side. (I have to say Degritter's responses are clear and concise, where Mr. Kirmuss' prose leaves me with a roaring headache).

If interested, the discussion is occurring here:

https://www.analogplanet.com/content/axpona-2019-turntable-round#comments

I've only cleaned about 50 records thus far, but everything is working great. I've settled on a "heavy" program of 3:45 for the wash cycle, followed by 3:45 for the dry cycle. Thus far, I've only used water. I just rinsed the filter and changed the water, and decided to use 1 ml of the cleaning fluid for the next 30 or so records. I can't say I noticed much difference with the cleaning solution after a few records, though.

PS, where are they releasing firmware updates? I'll gladly take the update.

 

Holy bejeesus!

I just received an old record I ordered from Discogs, rated as Near Mint. I cleaned with a brush and played it, and it was the single most noisy record I've ever heard. A tsunami of crackling covering up the music. I sent off a pissed off reply about it's condition. Perhaps a bit too soon.

I put it through a double wash in the Degritter (no surfactant) and the darn thing is almost silent! Virtually all the noise gone! It went from something I'd toss in a bin to almost silent! Wow! Didn't think that was possible. (And I don't expect it as a matter of course for other records).

 

@COF, Bravo. In this case, obviously a thorough cleaning was just the ticket to restore the lp’s sound. I’ve got a friend who bought an album off Discogs which was crackling and popping like you described. Though in this instance the issue was a chronic case of static build up. He would lift the records off the table which lead to an almighty crack of static through the speakers. He ran the lp’s through his Acoustic Revive RL-30 MkIII Demag/Destat machine and voila! The static was gone & my friend reports the sound is now more relaxed.

 

Where are firmware updates located? Thanks.

 

I was only told by Taniel that Degritter would soon be providing a firmware update. I have no other details, and I don't know how we get that update.

 

Any further updates on the Degritter? Curious if people are happy with the cleaning of their LPs. I'll bet 2/3 of the LPs I've bought off Discogs look good but have way too many pops and clicks. I need a good US cleaner!

 

Mine has been flawless so far.

 

Gentlemen, I'm so glad the early user reports are positive. I obv took a little punt going the beta tester route, and then bringing Degritter to the attention of everyone. Good to know it's working out for people.

 

What does the degritter do, if anything, to keep the water clean or filtered in between changes?

 

My Degritter has been functioning very well, with only one or two hiccups that didn't last long. (One time the selector screen went blank, and that was solved by unplugging the machine and starting it again).

Aside from that, operation seems smooth and flawless.

I'm still trying to decide if I'll go back to using surfactant or stick with just distilled water.

Every record I've cleaned with the Degritter, new or old, has sounded "more clean" and pure afterward - the amount of ticks and pops being taken away varies. I'm also trying to get used to a record cleaner of this power/quality - the records sound both more pure and clean, but also (because of this?) a little different after cleaning.

 

In the interest of full disclosure, I purchased an ultrasonic bath and the accessories necessary to make a DIY US record cleaner probably 2-3 yrs ago. In my experience, it is WAY better than the VPI 16.5 and Disk Doctor brushes I had been using. It works extremely well for the most records (maybe 60-70%) to get rid of virtually all clicks and pops, as long as I clean records for at least 15-20 minutes and only clean at most 2 at a time. However, 20-30% of my records need 2-3 cleanings, and maybe 10% never get rid of enough clicks and pops to make the record listenable. I am planning to buy an US cleaner that both works better AND is more user-friendly.