[Billbaxter (OP)]

A friend of mine is a big collector of vinyl records.  For years he has been carefully taking records out of their original sleeves, putting them in new paper sleeves and clear vinyl outer sleeves.

He has found that the records have deteriorated over the years.  There appears to be a patina on the records and they hiss when played.  Sometime he puts a cardboard sheet in one side - then the side with a sheet is undamaged.  The vinyl sleeves appear to be causing the problem.

Is it plasticiser in the outer sleeves?  They are actually sold specifically to help preserve the records!!  Can he do anything to restore the records?

[imatfaal]

Dunno about the science - chemistry is not my thing; but the lawyer in me makes me think that there might be a claim brewing.  Don't let your friend throw anything away - and I wouldn't try any rescue techniques.  I know some vinyl collections are worth a fortune, if your friends is one of these perhaps a trip to Messrs Sue, Grabbit, & Run might be in order eventually.

BTW - if I was the manufacturer on first approach I would tell your friend a whole load of baloney about user risk, terms and conditions, limitation of liability, privity of contract etc - but frankly your friend as an individual consumer has a barrel load of rights.  Perhaps the first port of call should be a consumer advocate, in the UK you could try consumer focus (if the UCT in No 10 havent closed it down yet) or perhaps even CAB

[Billbaxter (OP)]

Thanks Imatfaal.  Totally agree with your sentiments but I suspect that the supplier (a grimy little plastics processing operation) would just grab their assets and runne.  So my pals' priority is to recover what he can while warning others not to do what he did.

And you are also right to assume there is a lot of money in that vinyl, as well as real love!

[RD]

PVC sleeves are not "archival quality" ...

Use polyethylene inner sleeves.
 Never use PVC sleeves as their chemical makeup is too close to vinyl and may cause imprints or fuse to the LP.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinyl_disc_records_preservation#Storing

[Billbaxter (OP)]

Thanks RD.  I guess that the recommended surfactant is sort of fancy Fairy Liquid so I'll try washing half of some low-value examples and leaving half, then see if that makes a difference.

I'm sure that when I was a little boy a lecturer said that plasticisers are typically oils.  Maybe they migrated from the outer (floppy) vinyl sleevs into the records.  If so perhaps Fairy Liquid might help.  Anyway it's a cheap test.

btw chemistry always bored the pants off me so I dropped it as soon as I could!