[78-L] The infamous HMV crackle

[Chris Zwarg]

At 19:23 05.01.2009, you wrote:
>Was this caused by long term exposure to humidity (abound in England)
>
>or by the use of fibre needles (used to be abound in England)  and piling up
>of cactus juice in the grooves?
>
>Or something else?
>
>Is anybody aware of some scientitic research on this matter?
>
>Erwin

I have heard that the shellac "mix" used in the UK was different from that used elsewhere, due to the absence/presence of certain naturally occurring mineral ingredients, and whatever was used as a "filler" was noticeably grainier than the usual mixture. The idea might have been to make the surface as hard as possible so that it abraded the (cheap) steel needles rather than wearing out itself. Certainly most of the crackly HMV/EMI pressings turn up in otherwise good condition, in my experience it is uncommon to find one worn to death, quite unlike pre-1925 HMVs which have much quieter surfaces when mint, but all-too-often suffer from rough starts and greyed-out loud passages.

I don't think the crackle has anything to do with fibre needles, as thorough cleaning of these records doesn't help a bit, and under a strong magnifying glass you see the minuscule pits and pimples in the material that cause the crackle on the ungrooved center area as well, where a fibre needle would never have touched the surface. Also there's no reason to believe that the Brits wouldn't have played Vocalions and imported US or Continental pressings with fibre as well, not to mention all those early G&Ts and Fonotipias that already were collector's pieces in the 1930s, and these are NOT exceptionally crackly today. 

Humid storage seems to aggravate the problem - moldy/mildewed records are always extremely crackly - but I doubt whether it is the only cause, as HMV pressings stored in their original covers or albums without a hint of dusty or moldy smell after 80 years are still cracklier than, say, Electrolas or Victors in similarly perfect condition. If only, at the time of the EMI merger, HMV had taken over Columbia's lamination process (almost as smooth as vinyl pressings) instead of extending their noisy stuff to Col. and Parlo as well....!

This is just my observation and conjecture; sorry I haven't come across any "official" documentation on this matter.

Chris Zwarg