Jimmy Hughes Review Aug 23, 2021 Hi>Fi+

www.hifiplus.com/articles/degritter-record-cleaning-machine/

"It’s as if I’d suddenly upgraded my turntable/arm/cartridge to something far more capable. While cleaning doesn’t always deliver miracles, it’s possible even to salvage damaged vinyl. The result might not be 100% perfect, but it sounds a whole lot better.

I appreciate how gentle it is and how simple to use. You can clean valuable, highly collectable discs secure in knowing they won’t get marked or damaged. It’s great just to press a button and have an LP cleaned/dried to a high standard with no fuss or drama in only a few minutes."

"I see music as a lifetime affair." [Rory Gallagher]

Alright, I'll post here!! Thanks ever so for creating this thread.

I ordered and it duly arrived and my troubles started... the disks I inserted just would not rotate. Puzzled, I contacted Peter who was really helpful and we looked and poked and pried until he said he was prepared to have it shipped back (at his expense) and a replacement sent out.

Fortunately I by this time had my tail up, and was not willing to have a piece of machinery go DOA on me. Looking into the inside of the machine showed there was a cam belt that had come adrift! My son managed to get it back on the sprockets and all was well.

I have used, and am continuing to use, the stock cleaning fluid supplied with the machine. Seems perfectly adequate and I'm willing to use it until I have got a baseline on how the machine works and how well it cleans... Once I run out, I'll make up my own!

You will need to update the firmware on it, and my model does not connect to Wi-fi to allow for seemless updates, so burn the update to the SSD card you thoughtfully purchased along with the device! Insert into slot, and boot up. Firmware update was fast, clean and efficient.

I have also got the old style water bin - so ignore the max level mark and fill past that. There's very little advice on how far past so I stopped filling when I felt like it. Added the cleaning fluid with the nifty dropper. No splashes or messes so I think I must have got it right.

The control dial is fairly intuitive just remember that pressing will start it.

I tried all three cleaning times (short, medium long) and quickly settled on long which is fine.

So what did I find? If you keep your records in reasonably clean condition, it works well. However it will struggle on grungier records, so I'd recommend a quick clean using stronger methods... or multiple cleans using the Degritter.

It is very quiet apart from the drying cycle and even that can be tweaked to be quieter. It tells you when to replace the water, when to replace/clean the filter, so it monitors itself.


I like it, I've been looking for a cleaning solution that does not involve too much contact with the record, is easy to use, and does the job!

Thanks Jon, helpful to get insights from a user.

I've been using a Knosti/Nitty Gritty combo with what I think are good results but the Nitty Gritty is on its last legs .. if a grinding noise and a burning smell from the motor is any indication. But, so far, I haven't had to administer the last rites.

From all the reading I've done the Degritter seems to be the superior product on the market. I'm feeling a drawdown on the play-money account is imminent.

Finally cracked.

I've done about 35 Lps so far, results are superb and echo all the feedback from other Degritter owners.

At the conclusion of the first batch it was interesting to observe the Degritter filter after cleaning LPs that had all been through my former cleaning process using a Knosti/Nitty Gritty combination. There was a helluva lot more black bits and pieces than I expected, especially considering there was no observable "dirt" to start with.

The big test will come over the next few days ... Ive got a pile of Rolling Stones/Led Zep etc records in my basement that I inherited, no amount of cleaning was able to remove the high levels of background noise so I consigned them all to the "sell" pile. I strongly suspect they have groove damage from utterly buggered old styluses but it will be very interesting to test if the Degritter can bring them back to life.

hi b,

do you pre-wash records before degritting ?

on the black bits...
when m fremer tested the klaudio, which doesn't have a water filter, he also noted the presence of a lot of black gunk in the water tank.
confirmed when i had a look at a friend's klaudio.

I will pre-wash if the records are really grungy. All my current records have already been cleaned by my former (now revealed to be inferior) process so I'll be throwing them in without a pre wash.

I had a pile I'd agreed to clean for a mate, they looked like he'd either eaten his lunch off them without using utensils or they'd been part of some cult ritual involving .. no ... lets not go there. They all got a pre-wash. It involves a quick blast through the Knosti.

What I also learned today is that you can't just barrel through 50 records one after the other. After about 20 -25 records the water in the machine heats up to the point where an internal fan starts blowing to cool the water down. This can result in water/foam being blown out of the machine. So from now on I'll just do batches of 20. If that gets to be a pain I'll buy a spare tank which would enable a longer relay. The other useful feature is that the machine has a sensor to detect when the filter is full of crap and the machine refuses to move on until the filter is cleaned.

The results of the cleaning on a handful of the noisy old records in the "sell" pile was interesting. Obviously physical damage to the vinyl won't go away. But I did have one of those moments when I heard instruments and background vocals I didn't know were there on Aftermath. A Jimi Hendrix Mono was revived, The La de Dahs didn't respond so well but I suspect the production was a bit agricultural from the beginning.

Tomorrow I'll be having a Saint-Saens Symphony No3 shoot-out amongst my now super-clean 8 different versions. Neighbour's cats beware!

Awaiting results of the shoot out

This looks like a potential cheaper alternative, I don't think it dries though.

www.knosti.de/shop/en/vinyl/109/new-disco-antistat-ultrasonic-new

www.jeremyyoungdesign.com

Ultrasonics + brush... nah

Single transducer... nah

No drying... nah

1249E ~2124 nzd... nah

Is the Hummingbird US cleaner on sale yet ?

The official release will be on November.

"The product development of HumminGuru has not been easy. As the project keeps ongoing, hidden issues and challenges often appear during the procurement, mold tooling, and product testing phase. We are now going through the most important stage in which to identify problematic issues during the sample testing and trial phases, and apply continuous improvement to the product. Our engineers have been spending great effort to adjust our solution approach and keep re-testing it to ensure the performance stability of the product."