Degritter ultrasonic record cleaner

Hi y’all, just a few words on what I think is a worthy alternative to the Audio Desk Systeme and KLAudio ultrasonic cleaners.

http://degritter.com/media-kit/

I’ve been a beta tester on the Degritter for the last few weeks, and am happy to offer my opinions and answer any qs for those interested.

I believe official launch is in early May, and at this stage after a couple of quibbles in day to day use, I’m planning to keep my unit, it’s been a pretty good success, and invaluable addition to day to day life as a vinyl addict.

 

The machine is new, the filters are new, and the water is ultrapure reverse osmosis water, free of ions, bacteria, and viruses. My hypothesis is that the degritter dissolves the dirt at the bottom of the groove but isn't able to remove it while the VPI vacuums it up.

The quality of Reverse Osmosis (RO) filtered water is dependent on the quality (total dissolve solids - TDS) of your tap water which can vary from less than 100-ppm to over 600-ppm depending on where you live. It is not uncommon for people to install a demineralizer/deionizer cartridge after the RO filter to get high purity water (<3 ppm TDS). The easy residue test that @rDin recommended is a quick check. Some people do monitor the water TDS, and this meter is about the cheapest accurate meter you can buy: https://hmdigital.com/com-100/. The meter is available from many companies with a price of about $50.

Are you using the cleaning agent that Degritter supplies, and if so, how much are you adding to a tank? Although Degritter may indicate that the cleaning agent used as recommended requires no-rinse, the experience of users indicates otherwise. To determine, clean a record as you have, then dump the cleaning fluid from the tank, partly fill with your RO-water only, and flush the tank to remove most residue from the cleaning agent, and then fill as required with your RO-water and clean + dry the record a 2nd time. The 2nd cleaning should remove/rinse any cleaning agent residue from the 1st clean provided the RO water is reasonable pure. Not that many people buy a 2nd tank so that they can clean/rinse; and the Degritter has a function that stops are the 1st clean without drying to allow the user to install the rinse tank.

Alternatively, switch to a no-rinse cleaning agent concentration, which will provide only wetting with no detergency. In this case, with the right cleaning agent such as Tergitol 15-S-9 (https://www.talasonline.com/Tergitol-15-S-3-and-15-S-9?quantity=1&size=32&quality=15) used at only 0.005%, the cleaning agent concentration is very low and most people use as a no-rinse cleaning solution. Note that 15--S-9 at 0075% will provide wetting rinsing is recommended. If you decide on using Tergitol 15-S-9 (or an equivalent), see Table XXIII in this free book - https://thevinylpress.com/precision-aqueous-cleaning-of-vinyl-records-3rd-edition/ for good directions on how to prepare and use.

Good Luck,

 

The quality of Reverse Osmosis (RO) filtered water is dependent on the quality (total dissolve solids - TDS) of your tap water which can vary from less than 100-ppm to over 600-ppm depending on where you live. It is not uncommon for people to install a demineralizer/deionizer cartridge after the RO filter to get high purity water (<3 ppm TDS). The easy residue test that @rDin recommended is a quick check. Some people do monitor the water TDS, and this meter is about the cheapest accurate meter you can buy: https://hmdigital.com/com-100/. The meter is available from many companies with a price of about $50.

Are you using the cleaning agent that Degritter supplies, and if so, how much are you adding to a tank? Although Degritter may indicate that the cleaning agent used as recommended requires no-rinse, the experience of users indicates otherwise. To determine, clean a record as you have, then dump the cleaning fluid from the tank, partly fill with your RO-water only, and flush the tank to remove most residue from the cleaning agent, and then fill as required with your RO-water and clean + dry the record a 2nd time. The 2nd cleaning should remove/rinse any cleaning agent residue from the 1st clean provided the RO water is reasonable pure. Not that many people buy a 2nd tank so that they can clean/rinse; and the Degritter has a function that stops are the 1st clean without drying to allow the user to install the rinse tank.

Alternatively, switch to a no-rinse cleaning agent concentration, which will provide only wetting with no detergency. In this case, with the right cleaning agent such as Tergitol 15-S-9 (https://www.talasonline.com/Tergitol-15-S-3-and-15-S-9?quantity=1&size=32&quality=15) used at only 0.005%, the cleaning agent concentration is very low and most people use as a no-rinse cleaning solution. Note that 15--S-9 at 0075% will provide wetting rinsing is recommended. If you decide on using Tergitol 15-S-9 (or an equivalent), see Table XXIII in this free book - https://thevinylpress.com/precision-aqueous-cleaning-of-vinyl-records-3rd-edition/ for good directions on how to prepare and use.

Thanks, the reverse osmosis water I use comes from a kidney dialysis unit and is controlled, free of any residue because it comes into contact with patients' blood. I'm using two trays and rinsing them. Today I washed two LPs without detergent and they came out clean. We'll see.

 

@Nefro

"...the reverse osmosis water I use comes from a kidney dialysis unit...".

I cannot say for certain that the following is accurate - https://www.netsolwater.com/what-is...-much-water-is-used-in-dialysis.php?blog=5655, but it addresses a TDS limit of 200 mg/L which is close to 200-ppm. The published limits https://mcpur.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Lit_AAMI-Water-Std_Brochure_W3T575827e.pdf are specific to bacteria, etc. This paper indicates that deionizers have been used in the past, but no longer - https://aci.health.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/306088/ACI-Water-dialysis.pdf.

Allowing a few drops of the water to evaporate is a very simple test, and that way it's easy to eliminate the water as a source. However, enough has been said, and will not be repeated.

 

I used to maintain some small RO units as part of my job. The early models from Purite had a ball valve in the tank to cut off the mains feed when the tank was full. The valve itself was above the water level but when it failed with age mains water would drip into the tank of purified water, though flow was still cut off when the usual level vas reached and as the conductivity meter to monitor quality was on line feeding the tank there was no obvious indication anything was amis.
The devil is in the detail.