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Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4969 08/24/02 04:14 PM
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Hi Randyman,

Yes, you named lots more. Another basic appeal of that era was that analog vinyl playback was relatively easy to understand. Digital technology is technically dense--incredibly so--which is why a lot of high-end vinyl aficionados hate it. They just don't understand it, whereas low-frequency tonearm resonances you could see--watch that woofer flap!--and warp-wow as the warped LP caused your custom tonearm to cycle up and down.

Do you remember the Disctracker, from Discwasher? I still have one. It was this tiny air-damped shock absorber you attached to the headshell beside the cartridge. It did the same thing as the flip-down brush on the V-15 series cartridges. I had one installed on a second turntable for my moving-coil and Grado MM cartridges.

And Chesseroo, the discrete 4-channel format really advanced cartridge design. It was technically premature, because the record cutter had to record a 40,000-Hz carrier frequency to carry the extra two channels. So the cartridge had to effectively track the 40-kHz carrier. It's amazing that it even worked!

Regards,


Alan Lofft,
Axiom Resident Expert (Retired)
Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4970 08/24/02 04:59 PM
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axiomite
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I have to live vicariously through you for these experiences.
Please keep me enlightened.


"Those who preach the myths of audio are ignorant of truth."
Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4971 08/30/02 08:05 PM
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Hey chess...
You want even more? I bet Alan and I could drive you to distraction with this stuff...

OK so here is something you may not have heard about...

Keeping a vinyl record clean (to minimize pops and ticks)was an ever consuming job. In addition to the disctracker device and brushes that were built into the cartridge (like the Sure V-15 and many Pickering models), several companies made tonearm like devices that attached to the turntable that had little brushes that tracked the grooves lust like the stylus. As the record went around, the brush was in the same location as the cartridge (but just 180 degrees opposite of the cartridge) This constantly cleaned the grooves at the same time as the music played - without causing any influence on the tonearm weight, mass, dampening, etc. and thus was a "different" approach to cleaning.

There was also a wet system developed for playback that involved a real committment! This system constantly spread a small amount of distilled water on the grooves being played (by a similar device as the dry dust cleaner). The advantage of this system (which btw I never used) was that it "suspended" dust and debris out of the bottom/sides of the record roove and provided "lubrication and cooling" between the diamond stylus and vinyl. The result was usually a remarkable reduction in the vinyl surface noise and pops/ticks. But it also resulted in a disc that forever had to be played "wet", or you wouldn't be able to stand the noise when played dry! Which is why I never used it. But I think a lot of DJs in night clubs did.

Music/HiFi history.... ain't it fun?

Got any more good ones for us Alan?

Randyman

Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4972 08/31/02 01:05 AM
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That is good stuff.
I remember i had a nice red brush for my mickey mouse LP player. I also remember it was pretty plush. That's about all i remember.


"Those who preach the myths of audio are ignorant of truth."
Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4973 09/01/02 03:09 PM
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Hi,

As Randyman noted, the task of keeping vinyl clean was indeed never-ending. The tracking brush I eventually used was the Decca Record Brush, but there was a much earlier one, also from England, with a Cecil Watts brand name. I recall having that installed on my AR turntable in the early '60s, when I was in college.

Even the Decca was a mixed bag. The friction of the carbon-fibre bristles agains the vinyl increased the static charge (although it was supposed to dissipate the charge, but it didn't) until I installed a ground wire from the arm that held the tracking brush. That helped.

But among my friends and reviewers, the true badge of a serious vinyl collector was whether or not you owned the Nitty Gritty Record Cleaning Machine--I think VPI also make them--which applied a mix of distilled water and alcolhol, rotated the disc, and vacuumed up the residue. The two friends of mine who own record-cleaning machines, and swear by them, have, respectively, collections of 13,000 and about 10,000 vinyl albums, which include multiple international pressings of the same album.

I could never quite justify getting one. Now, I play vinyl so seldom that I wouldn't consider it. Still, they are neat machines.

Re the "wet playing": a marvelous host of a CBC national classical FM program ("Off the Record") in Canada, Bob Kerr, used to occasionally use wet playback on air for rare pressings from his own collection. It worked extremely well, but Randyman is right. The wet playback leeched out the chemical vinyl stabilizers, so the disc would become unlistenably noise except with wet playback.

Regards,


Alan Lofft,
Axiom Resident Expert (Retired)
Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4974 09/01/02 10:49 PM
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Alan,

GREAT STUFF!

I knew you could jog my memory even more. I remember all those brands/devices - but I never owned the NGRCM either. I did use the discwasher system almost religously - walnut handle, red plush material and the "secret formula" discwasher cleaning fluid, ion generator anti-static gun, stylus cleaning brush and fluid. (All in a sweet case with wood base) Why I even used the Stanton permanent anti-static spray-on system. Man, would I ever like to have all the $ back that I spent on that stuff!

Thanks again Alan. I think it helps when the "younger" generation know and (hopefully) understands some the history of audio/HI-FI gear.

Randyman

Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4975 09/02/02 12:33 AM
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Randyman and Alan,

Ah, yes. The added steps to listening to vinyl was a pain, but worth it in the end if you had a good setup. I love the clear sound of CDs, but thought something was missing until SACDs and DVD-Audio came out.

BTW, I'm surprised neither of you mentioned the ZeroStat Gun.

David


Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4976 09/02/02 09:14 AM
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davehead

You are right - it was a pain - albeit a necessary one!

I didn't mention the Zerostat gun by name (I didn't want to over do the advertising for discwasher inc. HA!) - but that is what I was describing when I mentioned the "ion generator anti-static gun". (It actually produces positive charges that neutralize the negative static charge on vinyl - at least in theory). And if you wanted, it was a pretty cool "weapon" to ZAP an unspecting critic of your chosen music! heh heh! (btw - great photo/link - but my gun is white) But I do have an error. Discwasher actually called it a "pistol" and not a gun)

Randyman

Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4977 09/02/02 01:06 PM
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Randyman,

I missed your discription when I was reading the thread.

I took the picture and still own those items. The Discwasher even still has fluid left! I figure they will be collectables before too long...

David


Re: Will This Damage My Speakers?
#4978 09/02/02 03:26 PM
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Davehead, Randyman,

I still have and use the walnut-handled Discwasher. That Cecil Watts tracking cleaner I mentioned was the "Dust Bug"!

And my Zerostat is white--I always wanted the red one! However, even better is my "National" (that's the Panasonic brand name in Japan) anti-static gun that I was given on a press trip to Japan. I don't know why they never marketed the gun here--audiophiles would have loved it.

Get this: it has a built-in meter that measures the static charge present, and it really works! You can even measure the static charge on your body, or any other object, in dry weather! Then you squeeze a trigger to zap the disc, and check the meter to ensure the static charge is neutralized. Disadvantage is that it's powered (four AA batteries). Mine still has the Japanese characters on it so I have no idea what model it was. Maybe Panasonic sold it in the U.S. but Matsushita in Canada never imported it.

And that expensive Discwasher "secret" fluid must have made millionaires of its inventors. I think it was just distilled water. Oh well, great fun.

Regards,


Alan Lofft,
Axiom Resident Expert (Retired)
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