[78-L] dewarping 78s

[Steven C. Barr]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "marc van Bemmel" <marcvanbemmel at yahoo.com>
> I am new to this group and have been reading along the messages for some 
> weeks. I am a collector of (classical) 78s from the Netherlands.
> I just saw the message on dewarping CDs. I would like your opinion on a 
> safe method of dewarping 78s. I have a few that are so highly warped that 
> they are unplayable. I was thinking of laying the 78 on a glass plate 
> inside our oven, which can be put at 50 degrees Celsius. Maybe I can 
> install a temperature measurement inside the oven, to check if it doesn't 
> become too hot. What are your experiences ?
>
The shellac-based compound used in almost ALL vintage 78's becomes flexible 
at a temperature
around 100 Celsius (my guess!?). What you want to do is to raise the 
temperature of your warped
78's to that temperature (there are several good ways to do this!) and then 
manually bend them
into flatness!

I accidentally discovered this when I left 20-30 78's on the seat of my '58 
Impala convertible
(which I wish I STILL owned!!) while visiting the beach in Daytona. The 
records had become
warm enough to be flexible...and bent themselves to match the shape of the 
seat upon which
they were sitting.

One can either put them into an oven set for 150 F or 100 C...or put them 
outdoors in a
full-sun place (between two large pieces of 1/4" plate glass works great!).

Steven C. Barr