VINYL BASICS
Updated Feb 2003

The 12" Vinyl manufacturing market is vast but hidden and very confusing at times. After buying records as a DJ, and manufacturing them for years I've begun to get a better understanding of this. Here's what I've found

Record quality varies enormously on a country to country basis. In Europe It would seems that in Germany has the best overall quality and sound. They invested heavily into plastic & chemical research after the First World War and that's probably part of the reason. Britain comes second, France, Belgium, Holland come 3rd.

Here are some things to look for when buying vinyl 12" records.

1. The weight. The heavier the better (generality). A heavy record usually (hopefully) means thicker vinyl and less rumble. This in turns means that the record may have a better signal to noise ratio. On the flip side pops and clicks might be louder too. You can't win them all.

2. The time. The amount of time used by the material greatly affects the pressing level. If there is too much music on a side the pressing will be lower Even if you use thick vinyl to make the record. This is because increased time also increases the number of grooves in the record. The more the grooves, the tighter together they have to be and the less deep into the record you can go. There are some companies who can fit 14-15 minutes on a side and still maintain a ridiculously loud level. Those records are keepers. Usually 7-10 minutes is a decent length.

3. Depth and spacing. The deeper the grooves the louder the record will be. Watch out for spacing though. If the grooves are so deep that the spacing between the grooves looks non-existent, listen carefully. Such records may sound good but they are more prone to developing skips. Cutting a groove too deep can damage the walls of the gr"center">


4. Vinyl color. The more black and less "see-through" the better. Hold up the record to the light. If you can't see through it this is a good start. The reason for this is that carbon black is added to the vinylite to increase the quality of the plastic. So a black opaque record has the better chance of being a keeper. Most high quality plastic records are pure black.

Don't get too excited by colored vinyl. Adding other colors than black increases impurities and hardens the vinyl compound. It may look cool but over time it will suffer more and sound worse then regular vinyl.

5. Check one-sided records. Some records that are pressed only on one side have a chance of sounding better. So theoretically you can press a better record. However, I seem like a rip off to pay full price for one side of music. Spend wisely.

A note on dub plates

Dub plates, tests, acetates, reference disks or whatever you want to call them have some unique properties to watch out for. These records look exactly like normal 12". Dub plates are commonly made of a thin metal 12" metal disc covered with a notrocellulose type plastic coating less than a millimeter thick. This record is put on to a special cutting machine. This machine behaves like a turntable but the needle cuts the groove into the plastic as opposed to reading it.


Every time you play a dub plate you destroy it a little. A good dub plate can't last up to 50 plays, but you'd better pamper it. If you find a track you love on a dub, buy 2 or more. Put one away and forget about it. Take it back out 5 years from now and blow everybody's mind.

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