@Packgrog ,
I've been using a variation of your cleaning solution recipes, dumbed down for me by another chemist in the community. I've been using a 10ml Liquinox per Liter distilled water dilution for my pre-cleaner, and 25ml/L Ilfotol for main cleaner, in rinsed out old AIVS dispenser bottles. Using Listener Select brushes and an older Okki Nokki, I've had largely good results with this, doing a 1 minute agitation of the Liquinox dilution, vacuum the brush and fluid, rinse agitation with lab grade water for about 30 seconds, then 1 minute agitation with Ilfotol dilution with a second brush, then rinse and agitate with that second brush. Do those proportions sound correct to you?
Response: The Liquinox is double what I recommend in the book Precision Aqueous Cleaning of Vinyl Records-3rd Edition - The Vinyl Press Chapter XIII which is 5-ml/L. But, if you are not having any problems, then the higher concentration is fine and the Ilfotol which is diluted to ~5%, the 25ml/L is fine.
Of late, I've been getting frustrated that this isn't enough, thus my stumbling across this thread in my unrelenting lust for the Degritter. I'm still torn between crippling perfectionism and being discouraged by all the manual labor. Reading through this thread confirms my fear from other positive reviews and the opinion of that other chemist: The Degritter would be a useful ADDITIONAL tool, but wouldn't shorten the process, as nothing replaces the chemicals doing their job. That makes the expense near impossible for me to justify.
I do have an older DIY ultrasonic setup that I've tried experimenting with recently, but my experiments have been... mixed. My setup is a Sonix IV 60kHz ultrasonic machine, and a DIY motor setup with an extremely slow rotation (5 rotations per hour). During one attempt to use a tiny amount of Ilfotol in the tank to maybe help with reduce my need for scrubbing, I think some of the solution dried onto the grooves of one album, as the first half of each side now has a persistent high noise floor compared to previously. I'd let it run through this for 4 full rotations, so roughly an hour in the tank. I tried another manual scrubbing pass as detailed above to try to remove that noise, but that didn't seem to help. Can dried-on Ilfotol be removed somehow? Or is it more likely that using that made my ultrasonic tank cause actual damage to the record? I'd been under the impression that 60kHz was far more safe for vinyl than the normal 40kHz.
Response: Long story short, you probably damaged the record. 5-revoultions/hour is = 5/60 = 0.083 rpm which is way too slow. As addressed in the book Chapter XIV, 0.5-rpm for DIY tanks is the target. You exposed the record at very low-rpm for 48-min, and yes 60-kHz is technically safer than 40-kHz but at the slow revolution you were using all bets are off. What is ultrasonic power rating of the tank? Were you monitoring the temperature? If so, how hot did the bath get? As far as the Ilfotol, as I said above, as delivered its diluted 20:1 down to 5% (and maybe less). To get any benefit as a wetting solution from it you need to get an effective concentration of ~0.0040%. If your tank is 6L, you would need to [(.00004)x(6000-ml)]/0.05 = ~5-ml. FYI, since Ilfotol is such a low concentration and they have changed the formulation down to 2.5%, I no longer make any recommendation of Ilfotol. The go to is Tergitol 15-S-9 Tergitol 15-S-3 and 15-S-9 Surfactant | TALAS (talasonline.com).
I've also tried using the AIVS Enzymatic Solution for Ultrasonic Cleaners, and at times it seems to be OK, at the very least helping reduce any static from all the vacuum passes. I'm just not sure if it's helping anything or not. I've ordered a faster rotisserie for further experiments, and in the hope of avoiding letting anything dry into the grooves.
I noticed you mentioned using the Down With Dirty enzymatic solution between the Liquinox pre-clean and Tergitol/Ilfotol final clean. Would the AIVS No 15 do as good a job there instead when fingerprints seem to not go away? Is there any real benefit in multiple passes of the Liquinox-then-Ilfotol process (rinsing in between and after each)? How the hell can I shorten this slog and reliably improve effective cleaning? Is there even any benefit to trying to use my ultrasonic as part of this whole process?
Response: The benefit of an enzyme cleaner after Liquinox is limited. The Liquinox is very effective against the same contamination that an enzyme would clean. In manual sink cleaning if you read the book, the latest is using an acid after the Liquinox. But the book says not to use acid with vacuum-RCM because you risk damaging the machine, and ultrasonics are supposed to do with power what the acid does with chemistry.
Hope this is of some help,
Neil
I've been using a variation of your cleaning solution recipes, dumbed down for me by another chemist in the community. I've been using a 10ml Liquinox per Liter distilled water dilution for my pre-cleaner, and 25ml/L Ilfotol for main cleaner, in rinsed out old AIVS dispenser bottles. Using Listener Select brushes and an older Okki Nokki, I've had largely good results with this, doing a 1 minute agitation of the Liquinox dilution, vacuum the brush and fluid, rinse agitation with lab grade water for about 30 seconds, then 1 minute agitation with Ilfotol dilution with a second brush, then rinse and agitate with that second brush. Do those proportions sound correct to you?
Response: The Liquinox is double what I recommend in the book Precision Aqueous Cleaning of Vinyl Records-3rd Edition - The Vinyl Press Chapter XIII which is 5-ml/L. But, if you are not having any problems, then the higher concentration is fine and the Ilfotol which is diluted to ~5%, the 25ml/L is fine.
Of late, I've been getting frustrated that this isn't enough, thus my stumbling across this thread in my unrelenting lust for the Degritter. I'm still torn between crippling perfectionism and being discouraged by all the manual labor. Reading through this thread confirms my fear from other positive reviews and the opinion of that other chemist: The Degritter would be a useful ADDITIONAL tool, but wouldn't shorten the process, as nothing replaces the chemicals doing their job. That makes the expense near impossible for me to justify.
I do have an older DIY ultrasonic setup that I've tried experimenting with recently, but my experiments have been... mixed. My setup is a Sonix IV 60kHz ultrasonic machine, and a DIY motor setup with an extremely slow rotation (5 rotations per hour). During one attempt to use a tiny amount of Ilfotol in the tank to maybe help with reduce my need for scrubbing, I think some of the solution dried onto the grooves of one album, as the first half of each side now has a persistent high noise floor compared to previously. I'd let it run through this for 4 full rotations, so roughly an hour in the tank. I tried another manual scrubbing pass as detailed above to try to remove that noise, but that didn't seem to help. Can dried-on Ilfotol be removed somehow? Or is it more likely that using that made my ultrasonic tank cause actual damage to the record? I'd been under the impression that 60kHz was far more safe for vinyl than the normal 40kHz.
Response: Long story short, you probably damaged the record. 5-revoultions/hour is = 5/60 = 0.083 rpm which is way too slow. As addressed in the book Chapter XIV, 0.5-rpm for DIY tanks is the target. You exposed the record at very low-rpm for 48-min, and yes 60-kHz is technically safer than 40-kHz but at the slow revolution you were using all bets are off. What is ultrasonic power rating of the tank? Were you monitoring the temperature? If so, how hot did the bath get? As far as the Ilfotol, as I said above, as delivered its diluted 20:1 down to 5% (and maybe less). To get any benefit as a wetting solution from it you need to get an effective concentration of ~0.0040%. If your tank is 6L, you would need to [(.00004)x(6000-ml)]/0.05 = ~5-ml. FYI, since Ilfotol is such a low concentration and they have changed the formulation down to 2.5%, I no longer make any recommendation of Ilfotol. The go to is Tergitol 15-S-9 Tergitol 15-S-3 and 15-S-9 Surfactant | TALAS (talasonline.com).
I've also tried using the AIVS Enzymatic Solution for Ultrasonic Cleaners, and at times it seems to be OK, at the very least helping reduce any static from all the vacuum passes. I'm just not sure if it's helping anything or not. I've ordered a faster rotisserie for further experiments, and in the hope of avoiding letting anything dry into the grooves.
I noticed you mentioned using the Down With Dirty enzymatic solution between the Liquinox pre-clean and Tergitol/Ilfotol final clean. Would the AIVS No 15 do as good a job there instead when fingerprints seem to not go away? Is there any real benefit in multiple passes of the Liquinox-then-Ilfotol process (rinsing in between and after each)? How the hell can I shorten this slog and reliably improve effective cleaning? Is there even any benefit to trying to use my ultrasonic as part of this whole process?
Response: The benefit of an enzyme cleaner after Liquinox is limited. The Liquinox is very effective against the same contamination that an enzyme would clean. In manual sink cleaning if you read the book, the latest is using an acid after the Liquinox. But the book says not to use acid with vacuum-RCM because you risk damaging the machine, and ultrasonics are supposed to do with power what the acid does with chemistry.
Hope this is of some help,
Neil
