Comments on Profile Post by spwath

Ultrasonic cleaner

Ultrasonic cleaner! However, if you take the Valhalla 2 route, I'm about to post a used one for sale with about 18 tubes, including a pair of Amperex 7308. Thinking about $310 with shipping and PP fees included.

Valhalla 2 helped restore my interest in my vinyl collection. Ultrasonic cleaners are for folks with expensive tables & carts.

If you're crafty (I gather spwath is) and scope it out right, I gather you can do ultrasonic for under $200.

Yeah, I was going to buy the ultrasonic cleaner thing for $130, then figure out a way to suspend my records over it. I'm thinking about that, my vali 1 is plenty good.

I still love the Vali 1. What headphones are you driving with it?

Hd650 kiss

Perfect! While I've owned two H650, I've still never heard the modern iteration of the HD650, let alone the Kiss, but it's a beautiful pairing with my HD600.

Less than 150$ for 40kHz. Might not be the best or most durable, but it works. Get a cheap motor with like 1RPM and build a cheap mounting solution. Not too hard.

Yeah, its quite nice. My records, however, are not. All second hand craigslist/goodwill/record store purchases. Goodwill has some great deals (after sifting through many, many, musty old bad stuff). All their records are either $0.99 or $1.99. But not the best condition. Could use a good cleaning.

Now I just need to wait for my next 1 or two paychecks, and then Ill order it. I accidentally got my Styx Paradise Theater record covered in dust...

Problem is sometimes cleaning doesn't help, either. Still, an ultrasonic cleaner is always a good thing to have around.

Yeah, but it will probably help on a bunch. And I can use it on other things, like my soviet Russian pocketwatch.

Valhalla 2 is stupid good for $350.

Beware of cheap ultrasonic transducers. Most are way out of spec and in order to penetrate the grooves properly the cavitation bubbles need to be sufficiently small.
The DIY Audio thread is great. This post is from two years ago but the thread is going strong. http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/analogue-source/218276-my-version-ultrasonic-record-cleaner-97.html#post4226898

If you want a high-quality transducer and nice controls, this guy is the real deal and used to work for one of the biggest ultrasonic companies (not audio focused, just the general field).
https://www.tindie.com/products/VibratoLLC/vibrato-80khz-ultrasonic-cleaner-/

That's about 6x my budget...