Vinyl Records - Care and Condition

So what's the fuss about vinyl then?

No, I'm not going to be drawn into one of the "great debates" of the last 20 years - a quick search for "vinyl versus cd" on your favourite search engine will quickly reveal what I mean.  Suffice to say, I listen to both and with a collection of several thousand vinyl albums and about 100 CDs, I think my own preference is clear. However, it's a very personal thing, all about timbre, tonality, treble brightness, "body" to the music - and to some extent what your ear has tuned in to, so everyone to his own. To many people, it's also about the pleasure of owning an attractive object - the record sleeve - which in addition to informing about  the music and the artist, has become an art form in its own right, particularly among specialist labels. It is also about owning something which requires your care and attention to keep it in top condition, and consequently you cherish it all the more.  Finally, it is worth noting that almost all  the most noteable recordings and performances of the 20th Century are on vinyl or shellac which constitute a priceless and irreplaceable musical archive of which only a fraction has been, or indeed is likely to be, transferred to CD.

A few tips on Vinyl Care

The comments here are largely common sense and based on wide experience, but in this litigious age I must preface what I say with the warning that you follow any advice at your own risk. Vinyl care comes into a number of categories and I will deal with each separately.

Cleanliness

Handle records with clean hands touching only the edges and the centre label area. Use both hands to do so, and avoid touching the grooved area as oils from your fingers will transfer to the playing surface and dust will adhere.

After playing a record, return it immediately to its protective sleeve. Avoid leaving bare records lying around as they will quickly pick up dust from the air and from any surface they are placed on, along with whatever substances are on that surface (beer, butter, jam, grease .. ?).  Records are also quite hard to lift from a flat surface such as a table top, usually resulting in a sliding motion over the surface as you scrabble to pick up your precious unmarked copy - only to find the imprint of every piece of grit on the underlying surface now faithfully reproduced over the record surface. 

Store your LP records vertically in clean undamaged inner sleeves. Avoid dust and grime entering by storing them with the open end of the inner sleeve towards an inside surface of the outer sleeve so that the record is completely enclosed. When inner sleeves become worn or damaged, new ones are readily available to buy on the internet, and it's well worth while having a box of new sleeves to hand if you have a valuable record collection. It's also well worth investing in some quality clear plastic protective covers into which you can put the record with its inner and outer sleeves. This will act as a further protection against dust and also protect the outer sleeve and artwork.

If you have vinyl records which are obviously very dirty, you can buy a machine costing several hundred pounds to clean them, or you can wash the record in a mild cold water and detergent solution, rinsing thoroughly after doing so, and leave the record to drip dry. Take care not to soak the label particularly if it is an early vinyl LP. 

I recommend the use of a brush and velvet wheel type of record cleaner (generically known as a dustbug) which keeps the record surface clean in front of the stylus as it plays. Some of these also drip a small amount of record cleaning fluid on to the record surface. Such attachments not only keep the grooves clean but also save excessive wear and tear on your expensive stylus. Remember to regularly remove any dust from the dustbug.    

Temperature

Vinyl is a soft heat-sensitive material which will warp and lose its original moulded shape if exposed to excessive radiant or convected heat. Store records away from direct sunlight, radiators, fires or other heat sources. Beware of hidden heat sources such as central heating pipes behind surfaces in a room - it happened to me once and I lost some valuable LPs as a result. 

Vinyl Condition - some personal observations.

Vinyl records are notoriously difficult to assess for quality. The most common method used by vinyl re-sellers, visual inspection,  is not always reliable as scratches can be hidden from the viewer depending on the direction and angle of light falling on the grooves, and problems lurking within the grooves, such as ingrained smoke, finger grease and dirt or damage caused by a worn or damaged stylus can go unseen. Even shiny new vinyl can occasionally be noisy or distorted if produced from a worn stamp, and certain labels were more prone to this than others. Rarely, the centre hole may be off-centre with audible results, and quite frequently an unmarked record will make the most startling percussive bangs through your speakers and on examination you will find small blobs of a hard yellowish deposit on the grooves producing all the noise. These deposits are most probably a residue of wax used in the stamping process and after carefull removal with a moist finger nail, hey presto - no bangs and pops.  So be aware that an apparently unmarked shiny record may have its share of crackles and pops while an obviously used (but not abused) one may be a delight to the ears despite having some obvious light scratches and marks.  Any vinyl buff will know that a slightly crackley old record that has not been played for a long time can actually improve and quieten with use, presumably because of the scouring and polishing action of the stylus in the grooves. You will also find that the combination of a dust bug record cleaner and judicious application of record cleaning fluid before playing often does wonders to quieten a damaged and crackley vinyl record, but do not attempt this on shellac 78's as alcohol based cleaners will damage the record. Dare I say it, but once you understand the medium, this all becomes part of the charm.

In general, people who love music become quite impervious to low level background noise and subconciously screen it out, hearing only the musical performance within the ambience of the background noise. Not so hard to do when you consider that music has to be filtered through the considerable ambient noise of any live performance.  Audio CDs on the other hand present the music with almost no background noise and while many people find that a positive benefit of that technology, many others find that it leaves the music sounding clinical, almost artificial and lacking character. Again, everyone to his own preference.

 With the best will in the world, it is almost impossible to avoid minor surface scratches and blemishes on vinyl in the course of using it as the material is soft, but these marks are generally inaudible as the  stylus either doesn't contact them or the signal strength of the recording is much higher than that of the scratch, rendering it inaudible. 

However, there are serious faults which you don't want to buy ,  the main ones being:-

- deep "needle" scratches - causing a percussive loud sharp thunk each time the record comes around

- multiple scratches caused by sand or grit entering the record sleeve and scratching the surface repeatedly as it is withdrawn and replaced.

- pronounced warping of the record, a result of exposure to excessive heat, and at best causing variations in pitch and at worst causing the pickup arm to jump from the record.

- badly off-centre spindle hole - a manufacturing fault which can cause noticeable variations in pitch.

- distortion and strong crackling caused by use of a worn stylus and / or excessively heavy stylus pressure.

In an attempt to standardize descriptions of used records and discourage the excesses of unscrupulous sellers,  various grading systems have evolved with a view to applying an "objective" condition scoring to used vinyl records. One of the better known ones is the Record Collector Magazine Grading System. Such grading charts are produced with the best of intentions,  but to my mind are not entirely reliable for the following reasons:-

-they are usually based on mainly visual examination which is highly subjective despite the rules of the grading system. The same person can quite easily apply different assessments of the same article on successive days simply according to his / her mood and outlook on that day..

- Visual grading often has little bearing on sound quality

- The over-emphasis on visual aspects has spawned a whole new type of buyer who wants records as collectable artefacts rather than sources of musical enjoyment.  The physical condition of the record is all-important to this buyer, and grading systems simply create an environment for dispute.

- Many rating systems fail to call a spade a spade. By that I mean that  a poor quality record should never be described as "Good" as it often is.  This is misleading. Numbers may also be used for rating scales but the value judgements to define the difference between, say  2 and 3 can be difficult in practice, are still subjective, and may lead to dispute.

How do I grade?

The simple answer is that I don't - well not in the conventional manner. I am however extremely fussy about what I put on the site, so I invest a lot of time and effort into ensuring that what I present is of an acceptable standard to a person wishing to enjoy the music. As an indication, all vinyl sold from this site will approximate to Very Good or higher on the Record Collector Grading System. The reason I use the word "approximate" is that  I don't follow the same procedures as the majority of professional sellers of second hand vinyl. Time limits them to a cursory visual assessment and a grading according to one of the published grading systems.  I have no such time limitations as I'm not doing this as a business so I can afford to listen to ALL the  records before listing them - hugely enjoyable but with the downside that time allows only so many items added to the site each week.

 I'm trying to provide records for people who like vinyl, who understand the medium, and above all who appreciate music, whatever the genre. I do not promise "vinyl perfection" in the visual sense,  but I do seek to provide a high quality musical record at a fair price which you will enjoy without the distraction of serious defects.

So how do I do this?

All my records are first visually assessed and those with obvious damage are discarded. The remainder are cleaned if necessary and played to check for noise and musicality. If there is doubt I will clean and play the record again and reject it if I don't consider it to exceed my own listening standards. Many rejected records I am happy to use myself, so hopefully that will give some indication of the minimum audio standard I apply to what is presented on the site.

All my listening is done on top-end playback equipment from Naim, Linn, SME and Quad.  These systems are sensitive and will pick up the slightest nuance -  and with  a  pair of ears honed from 40 years listening to music,  I judge that if I'm satisfied with the record, it is likely to please 99% of people.

Finally, please remember that  I'm not selling the records as pristine investment vehicles but as quality used items to people who enjoy listening to music. If you are that type of person, you will not be let down.