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Anyone else play records while they are "still wet?"

dr. eric

dr. eric

"old at heart"
Whenever I record vinyl to CD I always get a way cleaner sound If I do not dry the D4 off of the record after cleaning it. anyone know why this is and for some records the noise comes right back but can easily be put away with a little moisture? and do they still make D4 in larger than 2 oz quantities? Or any great home made brews? I've been using boiled water (cooled) and 91 % alcohol and a drop of dawn.
 
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This used to be a pretty popular way to play vinyl. However, IIRC once you play them wet, you won't be able to play them dry again with any decent fidelity. Not sure why, or if that is true, but I let mine dry first.
 
they seem to be the same as they were before. i dont leave them wet if i do not have to. but some dont sound good at all unless they are wet.
 
I heard about listening to "wet" records many years ago, the thing is, you have to use a liquid that leaves no residue when it dries or you could be in trouble. Distilled water was mentioned. I always wanted to try it...Im guessing the improvement has something to do with damping?
 
I have used this method when doing needledrops of extremely noisy records, and it can make a significant improvement.

At the end of the side, I give both the stylus and record a thorough cleaning.
 
HI,
When the Thorens TD-125 was in production, the Thorens tonearm that was supplied by the factory had two anti-skating scales; one for dry playing and one for wet. The wet scale applied significantly less skating compensation. I assume this is because the fluid significantly reduced groove friction. I think, without knowing for sure, that this is the primary reason for playing wet. A side effect could be a reduction of static charge though I don't think distilled water (which is non-conductive) would give this effect.

Sparky
 
Years ago (I mean a couple decades ago, when vinyl hadn't yet been temporarily upstaged by the upstart CDs...) I used to enjoy playing LPs "wet" sometimes. It did seem to improve the sound, especially on some noisier records.

I never do it now, as I have an RCM, which seems to have a similar beneficial effect on sound. Since the vacuum of the RCM dries the record surface, I don't bother to "re-wet" it.

I can think of several possible reasons why water on the surface changes the sound. These are all just theoretical possibilities; I have never heard a proper, scientifically-proven explanation for the sonic differences. Here goes a little brainstorming:

1. The water acts as a lubricant, helping the stylus move more smoothly through the grooves.

2.The water acts as a dampener, reducing excessive "bounce" vibration/resonance of the stylus and cantilever, and restricting its movement to that actually caused directly by the sides of the groove. {Note: I've never heard anyone speak of this type of vibration...it's purely a wild guess.}

3. The water acts to help dissipate heat caused by friction, thus keeping both stylus and vinyl cooler. Warmer vinyl will be softer and thus distort more easily, so the water-cooled vinyl keeps its shape better, resulting in clearer sound.

4. The water acts as a lubricant for the grit and gunk in the groove, helping it to "flow" out of the way of the stylus, thus getting a "cleaner" tracking of the groove.

5. The water helps wash debris from the stylus, preventing any build-up of gunk on the stylus that would impair sound.

6. The water across the grooves of the record as a whole adds mass/weight to the disc. This has an effect a little bit like adding a weight: it couples the record better to the mat.

7. Simultaneously, the water in the grooves provides a spiral of "water trough" dampening channels across the surface of the record, further reducing/dampening/absorbing unwanted vibration. In micro effect, a vibration travelling across the disc will have to pass through alternate ridges of vinyl and water (at least in the surface layers of the record), which will dampen a lot.

8. Water in the troughs will also help absorb any air-born sound vibrations hitting the record, which might otherwise be passed through to the stylus. Just think of what happens to air-borne sound when you dip your head below water level in a swimming pool.

9. The stylus is very happy for the chance to go swimming, because it enjoys swimming, so it pays you back for the treat by performing better for you.

10. The stylus and cantilever, being metal, hate swimming in water and think you are punishing them for not performing well enough. So they try to do much better to please you, so you will remove the evil wet-wet from their path.

Of course, the above ASSUMES that there is actually some improvement in sound. If memory serves me right after all these years, there were trade-offs in sound: less surface noise, bigger bass (not sure if it was actually better!), but perhaps some loss of highs? I remember sometimes thinking the sound was better, and at other times thinking it wasn't.

:scratch2: This raises another possibility:

11. Psychoacoustic phenomema involved???

Maybe someone else will have better explanations.

I have no intention of going back to playing "wet", but after this thread, heck, I might experiment a little... but NOT with my best records and styli/carts. Somehow the idea just makes me a bit nervous these days. After all, you are asking the stylus to move through a much more resistive medium, when it passes through water instead of air as it tracks along the groove.

Maybe that's a good thing, maybe it isn't. Now I spend so much time and care renovating, setting up and adjusting, tweaking, etc... with protractors, test records, etc... that I'm leery of trying anything with unknown and possibly adverse consequences. Years ago, I was free (in my relative ignorance of the physics involved and the potential for harm) to experiment and to have fun. I still like to experiment, but much more cautiously than before. Of course, I have better gear and get markedly better sound from it than I had back then, so perhaps it is worth it.
 
Playing records wet is the quickest way to wreck them. Why? because the vinyl doesn't get hot enough to reflow back to normal after the stylus has passed - the water cools it down, so as the stylus passes it just tears into the record, wearing it much quicker. It was proved many times back in the days when vinyl records were the highest selling music sources - play a record wet, and then measure THD (total harmonic distortion) when it's played a second time. THD increased exponentially when records were played wet, compared to when they were played dry, when it just added a bit of THD each time it was played. DON'T repeat DON'T play them wet, or you'll be looking for new records much earlier than everyone who plays them dry. I can vouch for the tests - we did it in my engineering class 30 odd years ago, and playing wet wore them out after about 5 plays, versus about 100 plays when they were dry (based on the same degraded THD level). THD went through the roof after several wet plays.

And when you clean records wet, allow them to air dry before play, or use a dry brush or cloth to dry them, or a vacuum to dry them.

-Don
 
When the stylus passes through the groove, it puts enormous pressure on the groove walls (even 1 gram of force on the incredibly small contact area of the stylus creates a very large pounds per square inch). Any liquid in the contact area is going to be heated to very high temperature (it can't boil because its under such pressure), and will very likely be able to dissolve chemicals out of the vinyl, to be redeposited elsewhere. This may be more of a problem than the problem wet playing was supposed to solve, since vinyl is pretty elastic and bounces back after deformation.
My opinion is based on what I learned when I used to be in optical fabrication. At the time (and maybe still) scientists didn't know whether pitch polishing is a mechanical abrading process or a chemical etching process because normal rules don't apply under conditions of great pressure and heat. I assume that this is applicable to vinyl. And the general agreement back in the 70s that once a record was played wet, it needed to keep being played wet (perhaps the subsequent wetting dissolved the redeposited chemicals, keeping the record from being as noisy as it would be if played dry).
But perhaps if you are recording a record and plan to use the recording of it rather than the original, it would be worth doing.
 
I remember an old Hirsch article complete with electron microscopic pictures in Stereo Review on this subject. Vinyl is intend to self lube and reset. Cooling cause plowing and destroys the record. Hirsch's recommendation was to play wet only as the last playing for taping.
 
Nope. Never. Too much risk for the stylus & cantilever. I'd rather spend the energy finding a better copy.
 
In the days of the TD160 with the TP16 arm this issue arouse and both the pros and cons were voiced. We decided to try it and picked a selection of records from the same production run and 1st did a dry playthough to mark the surface noise of each. We did this on paper and also by recording each onto a Crown 822 at 15ips.

We then played one wet and one dry. The wet play yielded less noise, pops and ticks but there was a slight loss of detail compared to the dry play. This was repeated for a period of time over several weeks with each record, allowing 24 hours for rest time for each record and gave us time to compare the recorded plays. The result was at the end of the experiment when we then played each record dry, there was less degradation soundwise for the record that had been wet played when compared to the recording of the 1st play when compared to the one that had been played dry. However, there was a split decision of those who participated as to whether the process was worth it b/c of the slight loss of detail when playing the record wet.

Since then I've played a number of records wet, using distilled water and can not hear any damage. Admittedly, I usually do this on recordings that otherwise would be too noisey though I do not have any problem doing it with any record I own. My table of course is the 160c with the TP16 arm with the wet setting for anti-skating.
 
Tried LencoClean for the first time circa 1986, and haven't stopped since.

Why?

Because it removes record-surface static charges, cleans the dust from the grooves and reduces overall noise.

Does it damage the record?

I think not, or at least I haven't experienced it so far (and I do play several records quite often, so I would hear if the sound deteriorates).

Although, I never compared the grooves under a microscope before and after wet-playing, but if anyone else has, I would like to know the results.

In the attachment there's a pic of LencoClean in action...
 

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As the only photo is the frog and dragon fly, might I assume the Lencoclean is the dragon fly? Next question is, how did you train it to clean your records? Of course, from wher it is at in the photo, it might not be available for work within a few frames.
 
I picked up some worn 45s at a swap meet long time ago, needless to say they were in pretty bad shape as I believe they were juke box pulls. I played them wet and recorded them. They were much quiter for that one play but got even worse after they dried and luckly I used an old stylus I had saved as the mud that was dug up from the grooves turned into concrete. I would not do it.
 
The record has to be cleaned before using the wet method. If you are digging up mud, it would appear you did not clean the record. The wet method is ot a way to clean the record and it will do nothing but make mud on a dirty record.
 
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