Audio Desk Dust Cover

[Guest]

With all the recent dust cover hotness, here's an inexpensive way to cover the opening of your Audio Desk RCM. It helps keep dust out but its real benefit is in reducing cleaning solution evaporation.

The product is named "CoverMate" - its a kind of shower cap that fits over bowels and other food containers. (Amazon 10 for $10) The AD machine will take either the large (gold) or medium (red) size - the latter has a nice snug fit. A fit flimsy, one lasts about 6 months or so, but they work really well. Btw, somebody makes a pricey acrylic cover for the ADS, but it doesn't seal the cover.

[A/V Solutions]

The shower cap thingy looks like a nice solution for dust and evaporation but I would be concerned with the rollers remaining damp and not drying well over a period of non use.....and creating some sort of contaminate (mold of some type) due to the machine being sealed up. I found a micro fiber towel covering the top works well and the rollers dry in a few days. With my AD machine the evaporation part is no issue as I only mix about 1/3rd bottle of surfactant to a gal. of DW and clean about 30 records with in 2-3 day period then dump the mix.....not a fan of keeping the water mix in the machine for extended periods of time for numerous reasons!

[Guest]

Jeff, that's an excellent point. The Covermate seal is not that tight, and I use my machine fairly often so I haven't had an issue, but what you say is definitely worth keeping in mind - check the rollers to see if they aren't dry, then let them air out. I don't change out the water as often as you, but I do appreciate your method. I'll make up a gallon (using a full bottle of surfactant) and keep that around to top up every so often.

Fwiw, I found a great container to hold the reserve mix. It is 1.25 gallon, has a spout and handle, less than 3 inches wide so it tucks away nicely standing on end in a cabinet below my cleaning station.

[A/V Solutions]

The Surfactant doesn't evaporate at the rate if at all like the water does, topping off with a mix would be increasing the surfactant level.....topping off with water only wouldn't change the surfactant to water ratio as the water is the only thing missing (evaporation).I know everyone has there own recipe or what works best for them, as always YMMV

I have a few similar containers too for fluids and such......

[Beaur]

A nice dish towel or similar would look better. Or why not some audio branded swag you have picked up over the years, like a t-shirt and or similar.

Also, I don't know exactly what's in the cleaning fluid but it's mostly water anyway and the concentration is very low at recommended dose. Don't think you will be changing the concentration very much if you top off using the same fluid you filled it with.

[A/V Solutions]

I agree it wouldn't be increasing the concentration by much but why increase at all.....

[Guest]

Hmmm. Had not thought about differing rates of evaporation. Wonder what is the difference?

20ml of surfactant into ~3800ml of distilled water. A top up adds v small amount..

I do do believe the surfactant plus the rollers clean better than water alone. Ideally I'd have a KA unit also solely for the rinse.