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Cleaned a few records today, including my original pressing of Dylan's "Planet Waves" only to find it was warped.....I could look around for a better pressing, which I have done for certain other releases, but with the review of this product in Stereophile, it seems that there might be a cost effective way to flatten warped records, which appeals to me on several levels.
I was concerned with using my oven, and see that they have a "Groovy Pouch" which allows you to heat the LP with electricity rather than baking, in a dedicated pouch. Anyone with experience with either the Vinyl Flat or the Groovy Pouch?
Thanks in advance for any comments.
Follow Ups:
if it's a severe enough warp that the ring can't handle it, i return the record or toss it....neither of which i've had to do yet
Warped records are so rare I hear true vynalists say that I wonder why such a product exists...
This thing makes sense. I have a number of LPs that could use a flattener. I don't doubt that the flattener that costs over $1500 did the job but there is no way I have or do I get enough severly warped cheap used LPs that I could justify spending over $1500. At that price it was out of the question.I have an original 1977 George Thorogood LP and an early UK pressing of Abbey Road that could use some flattening. I'm sure there are quite a few others in my collection that falls into the "I wish I had a LP flattener" category.
A tad over $150USD is exactly the right price point to rescue cheap LPs from the trash heap. Spending $1500 for the same thing is close to lunacy.
Conversely, if I had multiple expensive warped LPs $1500 might sound reasonable. The expensive LPs that I own are all the kind of LPs that better be flat or I would have sent them back to the dealer. Not spend another $1500 to flatten them.
Maybe its just me,
EdPS. My Vinyl Flat and the warming pouch is supposed to be here Friday.
We don't shush around here!
Life is analog...digital is just samples thereof
Edits: 05/09/12 05/09/12
Ed, for that price, I dont think you'll be unhappy. Let us know how you like it,,,,,
What???? Are you saying that records that are warped are rare?
I am just back from a short break in Europe. I bought 25 LPs and I would say that 15 of these (if not more) have some degree of warping. An original Dutch pressing of Jesse Winchester's 'Let the Rough Side Drag' is probably the worst even though I know that this record was never played or removed from its paper inner sleeve until I bought it! Warping that occurs over a long period (this is a 1976 release) takes time and patience to correct but I have already made progress. The disc is completely flat on one side and very warped on the other. The pressing quality on the playable side is flawless and this will replace my noisy U.S. original.
Even newly pressed records can at times have undulations that need correction. Not to be disparaging, who are these 'vinylists' who say warped records are rare? I can tell you that virtually 60% of second hand vinyl that I buy is warped and even at times Japan vinyl can be warped. Bear in mind too, every undulation on a disc counts as a warp, in my book. I would say that warped records resembling the proverbial potato chip are rare.
On the contrary, I think these are wonderful products because not everybody's budget can stretch to the more high end offerings from Furutech, Orbe, Axiss etc.
I have 2 out of about 500 records that exhibit the arm, not merely the stylus, moving up and down noticeably. To me, the arm moving is warp, that's what is audible, and it's rare.
Yes, I think we have different views of what constitutes a warp. Personally, I dislike any kind of undulation on an LP and I always try to correct it, almost always with success. Warps that arise over a long period of years take longer to correct though.
I don't know what kind of LPs you have but if you were buying them in the 70s, 80s etc. in the U.S., they were always warped to a greater or lesser extent due to overly tight shrink wrap. I have even had CBS/Sony Japan LPs that were factory shrink wrapped and warped! They are completely flat now though.
During the late 1990s I bought a large number of sealed U.S. LPs from a U.K. dealer over a period and they were always warped to one degree or another. It was because of that I had to get a flattening unit. I have maybe 6K+ records and my unit is working every week for the last 7 years. In fact, in the near future, I plan to offer a service to audiophiles/collectors. Remember also, playing warped records can do serious damage to loudspeaker units. This happened to a friend of mine a few years back.
I would say that the audiophile releases of the past 17 years or so are less prone to warps (MoFi, Classic, Speakers Corner, Analogue Productions etc.) but even at that there have been warping issues with QRP discs (dish warps mostly)in recent times. It's the nature of the material I'm afraid, but happily it is reversible unless it arises from a serious manufacturing defect or from excess heat!
it seems that if you check the oven with a good thermometer at the position the flatter will be used, and set accordingly, there's little danger of what happened to mejias. ovens are notorious for being off so checking just before you use it would be the best procedure for it.
...regards...tr
Haven't tried the oven but the Groovy Pouch seems foolproof.
There is an fairly extensive thread over at Audiogon. I posted my results as well as some videos. It has worked well for me although the heat/cool cycles have been far longer than the website states.
"It has worked well for me although the heat/cool cycles have been far longer than the website states."
Can you explain the practical significance of your discovery?
I initiated the thread at Audiogon Wintermute refers to.
In terms of the practical significance of his comment, many of the folks who tried it with the groovy pouch with significantly warped records found that they had to live it going for a lot longer than the basic recommendation of the instructions to get the desired results, and they also had to do more than one treatment. That's practically significant!The oven users fared better with good calibration, IIRC.
A couple of us had problems with the pouch. One guy's didnt work at all and they replaced it graciously he reported (certainly the principal is a cool guy and they respond instantly and professionally to your order). My pouch didnt work at first, but I fiddled with the connection and seemed to work okay after. I wasnt about to send it back as it was a small sum of money and I'm Canadian so the cross -border hassle isnt worth the effort. If it quits I'll just use the oven.
I think it's a big bargain for the dollars, well constructed and thought out. The guy could have put it on the market for a few hundred more and the big time spenders would more likely gobble it up.
I hope this post was practical and meaningful for you. Soulfood is such a nice name, and should inspire all kinds of cultural goodness and wonder.
Edits: 05/12/12
Yes, it means that you may have to leave your difficult warps cookin' in the flattener for 48 hours and cool for as long as 24. I don't really know if the cool down needs to be this long, I just lengthened it as my cook times increased figuring the stress relief couldn't hurt.
Here is a link to a thread on Agon. Pretty good explaination as to the workings and success/failures. My posts are WntrMute2.
Edits: 05/07/12
It works for you. That's good, right?
Soulfood, what are you getting at? Have you tried it with or without the pouch? What has been your experience?
Why did you respond to my initial post with a meaningless caveat/link, if you didn't understand it?
What exactly was meaningless about my post or link? I do not know whether you have either the vinyl flat or the pouch from your posts. Why do you bother to read or respond to me if I post meaningless comments? I think reading back over the posts in this thread, you are the one unable to comment intelligently.
"What exactly was meaningless about my post or link?"
I initially, said, "Haven't tried the oven but the Groovy Pouch seems foolproof."
IMO, your contribution was meaningless to me. You want extra credit for making my point?
"I do not know whether you have either the vinyl flat or the pouch from your posts."
You're too full of yourself.
"I think reading back over the posts in this thread, you are the one unable to comment intelligently."
You've been hurt, haven't you?
seems to me he did add some meaningful info to the thread...unlike you
thanks WntrMute2 for the link to a good discussion!
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