Caring For Your Vinyl Records

Cleaning your vinyl record collection does'nt have to be a major overhaul of all that is holly, the best idea is to simply keep your vinyl clean as you play them. While this is'nt always practical for professional DJs on the move, there is still no excuse for letting your most treasured gems get neglected. To start with you can use a basic water solution with a tiny amount of alcohol (80% vol.) (1 part alcohol to 20 parts water). Strictly speaking it is not good practice to use alcohol when cleaning vinyl as pure undiluted alcohol in contact with vinyl for long periods of time may cause damage but sticking to the mentioned ratio will be fine for general cleaning. Alcohol Can be easily mixed with water and will leave next to no residue. For even better cleaning you should use the purest water available and ensure the alcohol is of at least 65% vol. with 80% vol. being ideal.

Use a soft, clean, lint free cloth for the cleaning and apply the solution directly to the vinyl with a spray pump or similar. You ideally want to put a very fine mist on the vinyl avoiding the centre label. Wipe in a circular motion following the grooves, do not wipe across the grooves as this will cause a build up of dirt. You can dry the records if necessary although with practise you can judge the amount of spray needed so that there is no residue left at all...lovely job! Clean the cloth regularly in warm water, and remember to shake the solution before use.

Do you go weak at the knees at the site of a scribble on your vinyl. Well if you do you might want to read this paragraph, as we reveal the trade secrets for removing those unwanted scribbles and stickers. Firstly you should know that sometimes fate sends a vinyl to a place that there is no coming back from, so if you are reading this in the hope of salvaging one of these such vinyl then stop now because we don't offer miracles. With that said there are a few sneaky beeky tricks that really can make a lot of difference. The biggest groan we hear has to be stickers on records, while we at 24-7 vinyl have a strict 'NO LABELS' policy unfortunately the same cant be said of all record stores, and inevitably we end up with used records that have stickers on them (if they have to use stickers they could at least use non-permanent peel-able ones, but Noooooo..! that would be too easy would'nt it) .

Anyway groaning aside the first thing to do when wanting to remove a label from an outer sleeve is check to see if the sleeve is laminated, you can normally see a distinctive gloss if its laminated. If the sleeve is laminated then forget peeling the label it as you will likely damage the sleeve. You can try spraying some Mr. Sheen (yes.. mr sheen furniture polish) directly on to the label, leave it for about 1 minute and then remove any excess with tissue paper, repeat the process up-to 3 times or until the label starts to dislodge. Be very careful when rubbing the label not to damage the sleeve. If the sleeve is laminated you can also try using white spirit, turpentine or normal lighter fluid to good effect although you should again exercise caution when using these volatile chemicals. It is also good practice to test the back corner before going all out in case the chemicals cause discoloration to the sleeve. Some people use hair dryers or even kettle steam to gently warm the sticker resulting in the glue breaking down and making the labels more peel-able. When it comes to writing or scribble there is still hope for some, black marker can be removed by going over it with a (same colour) dry erase marker (from the school whiteboard). Again mr sheen makes umpteen things clean :) but go easy, especially on vinyl centres as these are prone to being smudged by over eager cleaners.

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