Playing a Cracked Record

[Mitkraft]

Hm. Recording a cracked record to CD.

Isn't that a bit like glueing together torn pages of a book and photographing it to make a copy for the Kindle?

Only if the camera on your phone audibly screamed "Oh the horror!" every time it came across one of the tears.

 

[Bob in WI]

I made the recording over the weekend.

First, I aligned up the cracks and used super glue on the rim to hold them together for cleaning. I also had to repair some grooves on a part that was slightly gouged.

Next, I set up the spare turntable with a cartridge and a stylus that was too worn to use but not enough that it would gouge the grooves and test played the record.

I expected three loud clicks for each revolution where it was cracked and either skipping, repeating, or a scraping sound where it was gouged. The cracks had a barely perceptible click and the only problem with the gouged part
was one dull pop. It worked out to a Goldmine grade of VG, and as a matter of fact, if the previous owner had taken reasonable care of it, the record would have sounded NM.

In other words, I got a recording that I can listen to and enjoy.

Cool that you got it to work. I think you beat the odds.

 

[jgordon]

I made the recording over the weekend.

First, I aligned up the cracks and used super glue on the rim to hold them together for cleaning. I also had to repair some grooves on a part that was slightly gouged.

Next, I set up the spare turntable with a cartridge and a stylus that was too worn to use but not enough that it would gouge the grooves and test played the record.

I expected three loud clicks for each revolution where it was cracked and either skipping, repeating, or a scraping sound where it was gouged. The cracks had a barely perceptible click and the only problem with the gouged part
was one dull pop. It worked out to a Goldmine grade of VG, and as a matter of fact, if the previous owner had taken reasonable care of it, the record would have sounded NM.

In other words, I got a recording that I can listen to and enjoy.

Do we finally get to know which album this is?

 

[Jeff K]

Do we finally get to know which album this is?

Just kidding.

 

[Spinning45s]

View attachment 897521

Just kidding.

Wow! You guessed right!

Now, I'm kidding!

The tune I recorded is "Here Come Da Judge" by the Buena Vistas. I probably could have grabbed an MP3 copy off of Youtube, but I hate lossy compression.

 

[Starquest]

I did this once and it worked fine. I used Wave Corrector to remove the repetitive click. The resulting audio file was perfect -- you couldn't even tell the record was cracked. Didn't hurt the stylus one bit.

 

[Vinylmasters]

I've done it MANY times for customers to restore a record - even gluing 78's!! ALWAYS use an older stylus. I always keep at least one 'old' stylus for 78's, 45's and 33's that are 'less than pristine' but still won't have sound issues for jobs like this. The key is in getting through it without skipping. The clicks and pops are removed digitally anyway.