How vinyl records are made

[Angie]

I thought I'd share this with everyone. There are two parts. Pretty interesting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUGRRUecBik

[MikeDee]

Aaahhh, the good ol' days...nice post, Angie...thanx! :cool:

Nothing like the smell o' new vinyl, right outta the jacket.

And the warm, fat [not phat] analog sound...wait...that's still very, very familiar to me...uh......oh, yea, I still get that sound in SAWStudio, that's why! :D

Er...ok, look, it's extremely hot over here in da Bronx...so turn me over every 15 minutes if you're gonna flame me, ok? :p

Regards 2 All,

[Cary B. Cornett]

I remember reading about the vinyl record manufacturing process decades ago, back when no one had thought of the CD yet. I noticed that the video left out a couple of plating stages that I remember being described. That first metal sheet that is peeled from the original lacquer is NOT the stamper, but is called the Master. From it, several "Mothers" are then plated. From each Mother, several Stampers are plated. (Steve Berson could definitively answer this)

Each stamper is only good for pressing so many copies, hence the effort to produce as many stampers from the original lacquer as possible. If the process is correctly handled, one lacquer can be used for the pressing of a maximum of about 10,000 records. For each additional 10,000 lot, a new lacquer must be cut. Making sure that all cut lacquers are IDENTICAL adds still more steps to the cutting process itself (I have heard of instances where not all manufacturing runs of a record sounded the same).

Steve, please check the above text for any errors... thanks.

[Bruce Callaway]

Speaking of vinyl, I met up with an old friend from the industry yesterday and he said one of the biggest growth areas for music in the UK is vinyl. There is no vinyl pressing plants left in the UK so they go to Germany. Very interesting and a surprise to me, can anyone corroborate or debunk this.

[Angie]

That first metal sheet that is peeled from the original lacquer is NOT the stamper, but is called the Master. From it, several "Mothers" are then plated. From each Mother, several Stampers are plated.

Yeah, I thought I'd missed something the first time I watched it.

[Angie]

Bruce,

http://www.sawstudiouser.com/forums/showpost.php?p=46444&postcount=36

[Bruce Callaway]

Cool, thanks Angie, got your finger on the pulse...

[TotalSonic]

I remember reading about the vinyl record manufacturing process decades ago, back when no one had thought of the CD yet. I noticed that the video left out a couple of plating stages that I remember being described. That first metal sheet that is peeled from the original lacquer is NOT the stamper, but is called the Master. From it, several "Mothers" are then plated. From each Mother, several Stampers are plated. (Steve Berson could definitively answer this)

Yeah - what they showed in that video is what is known as "one step processing" - where they plate a stamper directly off of the lacquer. While this is the highest fidelity way to go - this is a risky way of making a record because at best you can only get two pulls off the lacquer master without damaging it - and usually only one - so once you damage the stamper (which happens quite commonly during pressing) you would either have to end the run or make a new lacquer. Generally one step processing is only done for short runs.

In three step processing, which is most more commonly used, first a nickel "father" - a positive image - is plated off the "master". From this father the nickel "mother" - a negative image - is plated. And finally the "stamper" (which is what is placed into the press) would be plated off of the mother. These additional steps allow you to create multiple stampers off of the mothers, and even plate multiple mothers off of the fathers if needed - so was pretty much a requirement if you were doing a larger commercial pressing run (i.e. over 500 units) or if you were planning on doing any repressing in the future, or having the released pressed at multiple plants at once.

In Direct Metal Mastering (which is what I was doing while I was at Europadisk) instead of a lathe with a heated sapphire stylus cutting into lacquer coated over an aluminum substrate, a diamond stylus would cut into a layer of copper plated over a steel substrate. These copper DMM masters could then have multiple nickel stampers plated and pulled off of them without damaging the master at all - so that it would eliminate the two intermediate steps of mother and father - allowing in general for better high frequency reproduction and for a cleaner sounding record.



Each stamper is only good for pressing so many copies, hence the effort to produce as many stampers from the original lacquer as possible. If the process is correctly handled, one lacquer can be used for the pressing of a maximum of about 10,000 records. For each additional 10,000 lot, a new lacquer must be cut.

Actually 10k units from a single stamper is pretty ambitious. Usually getting around 1000 - 3000 before they would need to be changed (due to them either getting scratched or breaking) was much more typical in the runs that I saw.



Making sure that all cut lacquers are IDENTICAL adds still more steps to the cutting process itself (I have heard of instances where not all manufacturing runs of a record sounded the same).

Recutting masters definitely has to happen once in a while for large repressings. This is why the vinyl mastering room I worked in (and all of the ones I know of) kept exact records of all settings used when cutting the masters - so that they could be recalled and redone at any point.

Of course sometimes in a repressing a label would deliberately remaster the record for a different sound - and sometimes if the new masters were cut at a different studio then the only way was to try and match the sound of a test pressing from a previous run as close as possible. So variations between some runs can definitely be seen.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[TotalSonic]

Bruce,

http://www.sawstudiouser.com/forums/showpost.php?p=46444&postcount=36

Except overall for the global industry, 1million (and growing) UK vinyl units sold is a drop in the bucket compared to the 14million units (and declining) US vinyl sold, and the 705million (and declining) US CD sales figure for the same year.

BTW - petroleum hitting over $75/barrel doesn't bode well for both people's discretionary income and the cost of record manufacturer's vinyl and energy bills.

Sorry to be a pessimist - just trying to put a dose of the "investor's reality check" on things here.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[TotalSonic]

Speaking of vinyl, I met up with an old friend from the industry yesterday and he said one of the biggest growth areas for music in the UK is vinyl. There is no vinyl pressing plants left in the UK so they go to Germany. Very interesting and a surprise to me, can anyone corroborate or debunk this.

afaik - unless something changed very recently - this is totally incorrect information. There is Orlake - http://www.orlakerecords.co.uk - running 19 Toolex Alpha's - and
Portal Space - http://www.portalspacerecords.com - running the former EMI plant's presses in Middlesex
and I believe a few other small ones too.

Portal Space provides Abbey Road and The Exchange mastering houses with their copper DMM blanks in fact.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Cary B. Cornett]

Steve,
Thanks for the additional info and clarification.
In three step processing, which is most more commonly used, first a nickel "father" - a positive image This is the first time I have seen the term "father" for that stage of plating, but it certainly makes sense, and is clearer language than what I had seen in earlier explanations.


Actually 10k units from a single stamper is pretty ambitious. Did you actually mean "per master lacquer"? From what you said, sounds like a STAMPER should not be good for Thousands of units... or did I misunderstand?

Thanks also for the comments explaining about DMM, especially the bit about multiple direct platings from the original cut master disc.

[studio-c]

I thought it was one of those 1950's industrial films and was listening for the old library music track, till I saw the digital equipment being used to run the show. That was definitely a "Back To The Future" mind disconnect moment.

I sent this link to my son's girlfriend (25 y.o.) who just got her first turntable and is absolutely fascinated watching the needle in the groove.

Thanks Angie. Really fun video!

Scott

[Angie]

Apparently it was from a show called "How It's Made" which airs on the Science Channel. A spin-off of the Discovery Channel.

I don't know. I haven't had cable since 1987. ;)

[TotalSonic]

I thought it was one of those 1950's industrial films and was listening for the old library music track, till I saw the digital equipment being used to run the show. That was definitely a "Back To The Future" mind disconnect moment.

Yeah - looked like the mastering studio was using either a Compudisc or Zuma digital pitch/depth computer - http://www.zumagroup.com/prod03.htm - to calculate the cutting depth and width based on a look ahead signal being sent from the preview line (with a delayed "program" feed sent to the cutting head a 1/2 or 1 revolutions length after so that the mechanical controls would have time to take effect before receiving the signal). Better results were actually possible in a lot of cases as far as my experiences showed using the last analog computer issued by Neumann built into the VMS-82.




Thanks Angie. Really fun video!


Yes - thanks much for posting that Angie! I definitely miss getting to cut vinyl masters but don't miss the heat (around 101 degrees F!) that you'd get walking into a press room on a hot summer day.

Best regards,
Steve Berson