Pressing New Shellac

[OrthoSean]

Not exactly - laminated records were not reground and recycled.

Sean

[Viva-Tonal]

True re laminated records....not long ago I read that on many 1940s and earlier records, if you find an edge chip on a laminated record, there is a good chance the chipping happened when someone chipped the edge away to see if the record was a solid composition pressing, and since it was seen to be a laminated record, it was rejected for recycling.

I'm not too confident using ground up old shellac records now would be that good an idea....wouldn't new records pressed with that material be as bad in quality as wartime records came to be? We all are aware of how much worse vinyl records made from 'regrind' are compared with virgin vinyl pressings....I wonder if the quality losses with shellac are just as bad.

[Wolfe]

I can't believe that records made from 80 - 100 year old shellac regrind wouldn't be fairly crap. Unless you were marketing them at folks who only want to play them on antique machines. But what you suppose the financials of that would be.

[Victrolacollector]

Although new shellac pressings would be nice, the complex process and cost to make shellac records, I do not think we will ever see new ones made. I think we have a better chance of having resin discs made to play on the diamond disc machine...it has already been done, Norman Bruderhofer made a repro of the Edison Diamond Disc advertising record.

[winsleydale]

Yes, since I first posted this, I have come to the same conclusion. After I obtain my disc recording outfit from Jerry Blais at Union, and hopefully work with Shawn Borri to get blanks, Diamond Discs are what I shall be recording. I saw somewhere on Youtube, a guy just made a silicone mold around the master and then poured the resin in, and it eliminated the need for hard metallic stampers. I'll probably try doing that, only thing is the records would be one-sided.

[FloridaClay]

Yes, since I first posted this, I have come to the same conclusion. After I obtain my disc recording outfit from Jerry Blais at Union, and hopefully work with Shawn Borri to get blanks, Diamond Discs are what I shall be recording. I saw somewhere on Youtube, a guy just made a silicone mold around the master and then poured the resin in, and it eliminated the need for hard metallic stampers. I'll probably try doing that, only thing is the records would be one-sided.

Wondering if with a pour process and no pressure it might not be very difficult to eliminate surface air pockets.

Clay

[Phototone]

Record presses still exist, and are in use pressing vinyl, that were used during the shellac era, actually pressing a disc in shellac is not a lost art, just adjust the time and temperature and dwell of the press to allow for the different raw material. The plated stampers would be the same, although of course the master would have to be cut for a 3 mil. playback stylus size, rather than microgroove. What would be the "stumbling block" is the manufacture of the shellac material. It doesn't come pre-made into pucks you know. I wonder how the very small record pressing plants dealt with the manufacture of the shellac material? Was there at one time a vendor that provided this material all ready to heat and use?

[winsleydale]

For the material, I wonder if you even need shellac? It's just a binder, after all. I feel like you could just mix the rock flour and candle black and stuff into modern resin.

[Phototone]

For the material, I wonder if you even need shellac? It's just a binder, after all. I feel like you could just mix the rock flour and candle black and stuff into modern resin.

Thats a good question, however it is the "milling" or "mixing" that is the issue, not the binder. As everyone knows, records have been made from various substances over the years. Hard Rubber, "Shellac", Styrene, Vinyl, Condensite, Celluloid, etc.

[Tpapp54321]

For the material, I wonder if you even need shellac? It's just a binder, after all. I feel like you could just mix the rock flour and candle black and stuff into modern resin

They could be made out of Durium and "printed" just like the Hit Of the Week records, it might even be more realistic to do something like this instead of shellac. http://hitoftheweek.blogspot.com/2013/0 ... g.html?m=1
-Tom