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Re: [ARSCLIST] Gassy inner sleeves



The discs kept slipping out!

Lou Houck
Rollin' Recording



----- Original Message ----- From: "Steven Smolian" <smolians@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 1:08 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Gassy inner sleeves



At one time, the thicker plastic sleeves were made of recycled plastic bags which had been used to ship bananas, or so anecdote has it. They were somewhat impure as a result. This may account for some of the problems.

The other is that the migration issue- plastinc to plastic- was initiated and/or accelerated by storage conditions. Elevated temperatures and/or great pressure led to the sticky-sleeve syndrome.

One partial solution was elbow grease and those orange-based cleaning compounds. Elwood McKee suggested this to me. They got the surface discoloration off but had trouble extracting the plastic from the grooves. More pads, etc, improved things further. There was a cost/time issue involved and I now use it only when the records are of consideable value. Unlike most such, graded visually, I play them. In part, the stylus works like a shovel and gets out (ot tells me I haven't gotten out) the rest of the stuff.

The Japanese-type semi-opaque paper sleeves seem ok.

Another problem is that some plastic sleeves were glued into the paper sleeves. Heat in storage- well, you know the rest.

Steve Smolian


----- Original Message ----- From: "Peter Hirsch" <punto@xxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 11:34 AM
Subject: [ARSCLIST] Gassy inner sleeves



The recent thread on the risks plastic inner sleeves pose to LPs was
interesting but left a few unanswered questions in my mind.

What about those "audiophile" sleeves, like Nagaoka and others? I am not a
chemist, but I am sure that some on this list might have more specific
information on what kind of polymer interacts harmfully with vinyl discs and
what sort (if any) is inert.


Some have posted their choice of paper over plastic of any kind. Has this been
tested out on any large scale (say, at an instititution with 10s of thousands
of records or more) or is this just anectdotal, drawn from personal
experience? Either sort of information is of interest to me, but it would be
useful to know what sort of basis was used for recommending one over the
other. If there has been any large scale trial, was there any conclusion drawn
on the merits of acid-free sleeves or on the use of rice paper versus the run
of the mill sort found in most commercially issued LPs?


Somewhat related, I am also wondering if using a static electricity discharger
makes a significant effect on the longterm health of discs and whether the
crucial time for de-stating is before shelving the record or when you are
about to play it. I guess one ought to do both just to play safe, but I am not
savvy enough to know whether or not how long the disc sits on the shelf in a
charged state makes a bit of difference.


My experience with long term storage of recorded media (I have been dragging
around some elements of my collection since the mid-60s) confirms that one's
mileage is bound to vary from the scientifically derived benchmarks (for
example: all of my cassettes, even cheapo 30 year old ones, are still playing
just fine on my less than professional quality decks, though I know that this
should not be so), but it would be good to know if there are any benchmarks in
this area,


Just a few tech questions from a non-tech mind.

Thanks in advance,

Peter Hirsch
punto@xxxxxxxx
(212) 569-8716 - home
(212) 714-8570 work (NYPL)


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