Re: [ARSCLIST] Question re DuoDisc records

[David Lennick <dlennick@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

A lot of these very thin aluminum home recording discs are flaking, and not just
DuoDisc. RecorDisc (orange label), Presto orange label (too bad, those were made
by a professional company but they're just as prone) and others. As for DuoDisc
being "quiet", any I've ever seen over the last 50 years have been so warped and
bumpy, noise level was generally way down on the list of attributes..getting
them to track was more of a problem, and this was in the 50s when they couldn't
have been more than a few years old and you wonder how new ones were ever flat
enough to be recorded on in the first place.

There have been attempts made to re-attach flaked portions, but be aware that if
the disc is flaking, the surface material has already shrunk and the grooves
will never line up completely.

dl

David Lewis wrote:

> Yes - I am familiar with DuoDiscs. These are cheaply made, instantaneous-cut
> discs. The first "homemades" I ever owned were a pair of these given to me
> by a family friend thirty years ago. What the correspondent calls "vinyl" is
> actually the lacquer coating on the outside of the aluminum center, and if
> it is already peeling there is little hope for it.
>
> This is a pity - Duodiscs have fairly quiet surfaces for homemades, but it
> appears most of the ones I see nowadays are on their way out - it appears 90
> per cent of them are flaking off. And these always seemed so durable, unlike
> steel-base Carr-O-Tones and others which rust and usually prove unplayable
> anyway. As there are no established standards for handling these records, it
> is hard to know what to do to preserve them. The standards may well arrive
> too late for most DuoDiscs.
>
> My advice - record the non-flaked-off portions at a very slow speed 2 or 3
> times, speed up the results and edit what's left together. You may get
> different grooves to play on different passes.
>
> David N. Lewis
> Assistant Classical Editor, All Music Guide
>
> "Contemporary composers, and at least a considerable number of them, explain
> what system they used, in what way they arrived at something. I do not do
> that. I think that the matter of the way by which one arrived at something
> is, for the listeners, unimportant. What matters is the final result, that
> is the work itself." -Grazyna Bacewicz, 1964
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
> [mailto:ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Joel Ackerman
> Sent: Thursday, February 23, 2006 11:47 PM
> To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [ARSCLIST] Question re DuoDisc records
>
> Am asked the following question:
>
> Are you familiar with those "DuoDisc" type records?  They have an aluminum
> center (substrate) and a thin coat of vinyl (I think) on top of the
> aluminum.  I believe they are records people made home recordings on.
> Anyway I have two (or three) of them and the vinyl is peeling off the
> aluminum.  I was wondering if you knew anything about, perhaps, repairing
> the peel?
>
> Looking at photos, it appears that the vinyl is coming apart - cracking and
> heading towards eventual peeling off,.
>
> Suggestions welcome.
>
> Joel Ackerman