So I have much to report about this RCM. First, I should tell you that I experienced a bit of frustration when it initially arrived (this delayed my review). Things can (and do) go wrong when you buy a product, from eBay or elsewhere. Having something go wrong is not a reflection of a seller, how the incident is dealt with is. So here goes part one of the story.
I anxiously set up my new machine and got out a record to clean. When I turned on the vacuum, I observed that it wasn't really drying the record the way I anticipated. I was having to towel dry the records afterward and this wasn't what I was expecting. This was on Saturday afternoon. So I sent Nick (the seller and designer) a message on eBay's board expecting to hear something maybe on Monday. I don't think it was ten minutes before he got back to me with several suggestions. None of those helped, so I started checking the thing out piece by piece. What I found was that the end of the wand (the part that contacts the record) had a piece of plastic blocking what seemed to be a hole for the air to flow to that part. The wand wasn't vacuuming the record at all, it was just pushing the fluid around. I snapped a picture and sent it to Nick and he confirmed my speculation. He was apologetic almost to a fault and did everything he could do to take care of me. He said a replacement part would be shipped immediately and he gave me a financial consideration for my inconvenience. He also offered a full refund in case I was put off, but that certainly wasn't an option I felt need to exercise. What he didn't know is that as he was typing all of that, I was working from his confirmation and got into the barrel with an Exacto knife. Though it took more than a little effort, the plastic was thin enough that I was able to remove it through use of the knife, a screwdriver to pry and needle nosed pliers to remove the offending material. So I contacted him back to let him know I had remedied the situation. Instead of saying "oh, good, now I don't need to send a replacement" as many sellers would, he wrote back suggesting that since the first one was now functional, that I might want my replacement in a different color to easily differentiate. Nick is an awesome seller!
BTW, I had planned to get a $15 shop vac from Home Depot, but they were out of stock. I found that Walmart sells the pictured Stanley for $20. I usually don't shop the evil empire, but it was in stock, smaller, and a good color match (a closer match than the flash on my camera makes it look). Well worth the extra $5 to me.
Now to the review. I had previously been hand washing my records in the kitchen sink with a label protector, Sporacidin mold cleaner, a paint brush and tap water. I had also tried a friend's Spin Clean, but was convinced I was getting far better results with the sink. These are my frames of reference for using this product.
There are pros and cons for this machine vs hand washing. The first big pro is time. I can clean at least five records with the machine in the time it takes to do one by hand. The first big con is the noise. I can't clean records with this machine after the kids have gone to bed. Then there is the issue of fluid. I used a LOT of cleaner and water with hand washing. On the machine, if you let the fluid pool on the record (as was my practice) the edges of the labels soak through. So really crusty finds may still get a hand wash first. To help offset this, I went from a wash/rinse regimen to a three step process. I am first cleaning with less of the mold cleaner, with less dwell time due to the lowered amount of fluid but more brushing because it is so much easier with the record being on the platter (and it keeps the record from drying with soap on it). Then after vacuuming the soap away, I am using a 50/50 iso/distilled mix, brushing it then vacuuming. Lastly a rinse with pure distilled water and a third vacuum.
This method is giving me results as good or perhaps even better than the hand washing. It is so much quicker and easier that it is clearly preferable in my mind. As I alluded to earlier, I believe that this RCM is far superior to the popular budget option, the Spin Clean. It isn't even close IMHO.
To give people a pragmatic idea of what to expect with the machine, I make a test subject of a Brian Eno album that came from the thrift the day before. I recorded a 30 second clip before cleaning and after. Links to those files are attached. I then took those files and ran them both through ClickRepair at default settings. In the left channel, the before file had 37760 repaired samples as opposed to 24416 for the after file. This represents a 35% improvement in clicks on the record for the moment it took me to clean it. Probably more than 35% when you consider than some clicks are scratches which can't be cleaned out. The right channel started with 32288 samples before and 25852 after, representing a 20% improvement.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am really cheap and don't drop a buck and a half lightly. I am VERY happy with this purchase.
Wav files...https://mega.nz/#!tplQkJ5Z!yZJLTCcKZ55yALxUIg49aeWGCpwI7QXFoVV6gy0Ix7ohttps://mega.nz/#!xgEDkZbL!GiE2Lx5aAcV5xgHpAbILOUA8C_Kolm5TOzOZoN46xs8
