LP CLEANING FLUID

‍    Many of the cleaning fluids offered for record cleaning machines have two problems. First, they cost far more than they should. Second. they contain ingredients you should keep far from your precious records.

‍    Some record companies actually buy their cleaning fluids from us, because they have had bad experiences with certain others. We make ours up with distilled water (and we distill it ourselves, too). We don’t use isopropyl alcohol, because it dissolves the plasticizers in the vinyl and causes damage. And we use a high-purity industrial detergent, not crude household products. Our half-litre bottle is a concentrate, to be diluted 7-to-1 with water (naturally, we recommend distilled water).

ORDER: Bottle LPC record cleaner. $24.95 Click to order it.

Though we recommend LPC for vacuum-based cleaning machines, we do have a kit for manual cleaning. It includes an applicator pad and a long-haired polishing cloth.

ORDER: LPC record cleaning kit, $29.95. Click to order it.

THE BEST RECORD BRUSH EVER

‍    You’ve seen those brushes with carbon fibre bristles that drain off static electricity. And you’ve seen those brushes with felt pads that do a great job of picking up dust, but actually generate static. What if you could have a brush with both? Done.

ORDER: GSX Record cleaning brush, $35.95. Click to order

STYLUS CLEANER

‍    Sure, you keep your record clean, but is it clean enough to keep dust from building up on the stylus?

‍    The AmCan DU-Stylus is a gummy substance. Drop your stylus in it, and lift it off, and the dirt stays behind. Wash it under the tap.

After each record side, we brush the stylus with UHF St(EYE)lus, in a small bottle with its own brush. By the way, we actually use both.

ORDER: AmCan DU-Stylus, $49.95. Click to order

ORDER: Bottle of St(eye)lus, $11.95. Click to order

RECORD STABILIZER

‍    This handsome stabilizer keeps your record from slipping and resonating, but it’s light enough to keep from destabilizing your turntable suspension. As a bonus, it includes a spirit level, to make sure your turntable is level.

ORDER: UHF-CL record stabilizer, $64.95 Click to order

TREATMENT FOR YOUR DRIVE BELT

‍    Most treatments for rubber belts are sticky, a last-ditch measure while you’re waiting for UPS to bring you a new one. This one is different, a deoxidizer for rubber. We first used it to revive a failing belt, but then we found our turntable didn’t sound as good with a new belt…not until we had treated it with Rubber Renue. Supplied in a small easy-to-ship bottle.

ORDER: RRU-100 Rubber Renue belt treatment, $8.95 Click to order

A CD TO BURN IN YOUR PHONO STAGE

‍    Got a phono preamp, or an amp with a phono section? So how do you break it in, short of playing deejay for the next 50 or 100 hours? The Phono Burn-In and RIAA Test CD from Granite Audio is the answer. Its signals are recorded on a CD at low level, with an inverse RIAA equalization applied. Just connect a CD player to the phono input, and put this CD in repeat mode. Separate sections for MM and MC inputs. Put an output meter on the amp, and see whether the equalization curve of your phono section is accurate.

ORDER: Granite CD-101 break-in CD, $46.50 Click to order

The UHF cartridge alignment protractor

‍     Most turntables come with some sort of device to align the cartridge laterally. The problem? Many of them are cardboard, or even paper. And a lot of those are wrong, so that if you follow the instructions, your cartridge will suffer from a serious alignment error.

‍    The correct way to align your cartridge is to get it dead square at a distance of 2.80 cm and 4.76 cm from the turntable centre. Our protractor makes it easy, with a mirror finish that shows you whether the cartridge is level.

ORDER: LPP alignment protractor, $24.95 Click to order

The London Reference Phono Cartridge

‍     Based on the original Decca cartridge, the Reference is neither moving coil nor moving magnet. It has no cantilever, and its generating elements are just 2 mm above the elongated line contact stylus tip. The result is a level of direct contact with the music that is unmatched. We liked it so much when we reviewed it (read the review here in PDF) that we bought it.

‍     The Reference works well in most arms (except straight-line tracking arms that are very short). It tracks between 1.6 and 2 grams (we suggest 2 g), and in our tests it tracked even the most modulated test discs.. It has 5 mV output, suitable for a standard MM phono input.

ORDER LRC, London Reference cartridge, $5495 Click to buy