Taking Care of Vinyl Albums

Most LPs, 45's and other vinyl records released in the last fifty years are made of polyvinyl. Vinyl recordings are durable if well-taken care of. Here are suggestions for taking care of vinyl LPs and singles.

General Vinyl Care

If you take good care of your vinyl LPs, you shouldn't have to do very much cleaning. Here are some tips for keeping vinyl in good shape:

• Get good quality inner sleeves. If the album is valuable, you'll obviously want to keep the original inner sleeve. However, a lot of older sleeves are poorly made, damaged or missing. Good LP sleeves can help protect your vinyl. Paper sleeves are fine as long as you handle your vinyl with some care. You can store the LP, in a new sleeve, along with the original sleeve in the record jacket.
• If your LP is valuable, store it in an outer poly sleeve to protect it from wear.
• Hold vinyl albums by the edges. This keeps grease or dirt from your fingers from getting into the grooves.
• After playing a vinyl LP, put it back in its sleeve.
• Store your vinyl albums vertically, meaning that they should not be stacked flat, or leaning significantly. If your vinyl is stored correctly, it should be easy to pull out any album, without it being wedged in. Storing records too tightly or wedged in will wear a ring on the cover. Stacking or leaning your records can bend the vinyl over time, leading to warping.
• Store vinyl albums in a cool dry area. Old records are usually stored in a basement, attic or garage, which are about the worst places possible. A closet or shelf away from a window is a good place. Excessive moisture can lead to mold on the vinyl and the labels.
• Avoid temperature extremes. Heat can warp LPs.
• Check your turntable occasionally to ensure that it is setup correctly. The stylus should not be worn or pressing too hard into the grooves.

Cleaning Vinyl Albums

Unless you are only buying new DJ LPs, you'll end up with some dirty old vinyl albums. Here are some suggestions cleaning vinyl albums:

• Use a disk brush to remove dust or dirt.
• Use an alcohol-based solution for removing grime that's stuck to the disk. There are commercial disk cleaners, but if they aren't available in your area, you can mix your own. Use a 1 to 1 mix of isopropyl alcohol and distilled water. The alcohol helps make the solution evaporate quickly. You can mix in a tiny amount of mild detergent, like baby bath soap. Some people put in a couple of drops of Photo Flo to help avoid water spots. It's available at photographic stores.
• Apply the solution to a clean washcloth or disk brush, never directly to the album. Cotton diapers, of all things, make good lint-free washcloths! The cloth should be damp, but not dripping. Wipe around the LP, following the grooves. Never wipe against the grain of the vinyl grooves - you could scratch it. Follow up with a dry cloth to avoid leaving residue.
• If you have a dirty cover, there's usually not much you can do. If the cover's glossy, you may be able to wipe it with a damp towel.

Take care of your vinyl!