Re: [ARSCLIST] Re-Grooving Records?

[Thomas Stern <sternth@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

  I must confess to having done something quite similar to this
on LPs 40+ years ago to correct locked grooves on badly scratched 
albums.  Used a magnifying glass and an Xacto knife.  Usually worked.
  Haven't even thought about that for decades....
  I can imagine that with finer scalpel and high magnification one could
do the necessary surgery to reform a groove.
  If one were to describe such an item, don't think it would be
particularly dishonest to omit the details, provided the basic information
that the record is scratched et.al. were provided.
  IMO!
Best wishes, Thomas.




-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Malcolm Smith
Sent: Monday, September 08, 2008 12:19 PM
To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Re-Grooving Records?


A bit confusing. I hope there are more answers to this. There are  
early acoustic records where repairs can be found using a loop. Also,  
there are white label special ordered pressings from HMV of one of  
the Pattis which, while they look like they are original, are clearly  
dubs. I only know of this one.

If a dealer is doing what is described below, he is clearly  
misrepresenting what he is offering for sale.

Malcolm Smith.

On Sep 8, 2008, at 8:26 AM, Michael Shoshani wrote:

> Garr Norick wrote:
>> I Know of a Record Collector who has mentioned Regrooved/Recut  
>> Records in his auction lists... I asked him about this and he was  
>> very vague about it... said he knew a Jeweler who had the ability  
>> to do this and he sometimes had him do this to rare records in not  
>> so good condition to make them salable, but was very vague about  
>> it otherwise... does anyone here know anything about this  
>> technology? could they tell me? Thanks in advance :)
>
> It sounds as though someone might have done some repair to a  
> damaged groove. I've never heard of this being done to a shellac or  
> vinyl pressing, but it was actually quite common for metal parts.   
> A metal positive (mother) would have some sort of damage to a  
> groove, and a skilled technician with a loupe and a (presumably  
> jeweled) stylus tool would re-engrave the groove at that point by  
> hand.
>
> Dr. Oliver Read's book on sound recording has a photographic  
> explanation of the whole process for mastering, plating and  
> stamping phonorecords, and this groove repair process is  
> illustrated. The record illustrated in this process appears to be  
> MICROGROOVE, so someone somewhere learned to have very steady hands  
> and nerves.
>
> (I suppose it was cheaper to do it that way than just recut the  
> lacquer and do new platings?)
>
> Michael Shoshani
> Chicago IL
>