tom (04/15/83)
I have an Audio-Technica equivalent to a dust bug. It consists of the
usual cylindrical fiber-ish pad to catch the dust plus a small brush
similar to the brushes you find on some cartridges. The difference
is that the brush fibers are electrically conductive, and there is
a grounding circuit which runs through the arm of the dust bug, to a
wire which you connect to ground. In this way they claim that static
electricity is grounded by the bug.
I've been quite pleased with it. I stopped using the fluid that comes with
it (one drop in the center of one side of the cylinder) when it ran out.
Now I usually run it dry, occassionally with a drop of Discwasher fluid.
I found that even after using my Discwasher the bug still picks up some
residual dust. Also, it seems that static electricity is indeed
significantly reduced. Unfortunately, I haven't seen it on the market anymore.
Can anyone tell me if there is value to this "grounding" approach or
is it in my head?
- Tom Beres
{we13, seismo, mcnc}!rlgvax!tomleichter (04/16/83)
I've used a modified Dust Bug for years. The modification was inspired by the Dust Bug-like devices with conductive bristles that are available on the market. My modification was to take a very thin wire - one strand from a zip cord - and spiral it once around the (non-conductive) brush, getting it will into the hairs on the brush so that there is no chance of it touching the record; it will get within an eighth of an inch or so easily, though. The wire is attached to the metal support for the brush. Another wire of the same sort runs from the metal support to a piece of aluminum foil taped to the end of the plastic arm that is most of the Dust Bug. (Since the support for the brush pivots, I didn't want to use just one piece of wire.) The aluminum foil is so placed that when the arm is placed on its support, which is a metal pin on a base, the foil makes con- tact with the foil. Finally, another wire runs from the base to turntable ground. I've been very satisfied with this; it pretty much totally eliminates static. While it won't eliminate as much static as a brush with conductive bristles, it's a lot cheaper - especially if you already have a Dust Bug, as I did. There is no need to be concerned about either the thinness of the wire or possible imperfect connections. Static charges are up in the 10's of kilo- volts, but are only capable of providing miniscule currents. Virtually all the charge will leak off very quickly even when the contacts corrode some- what. There is also no reason to be concerned about the distance from the wire to the record. The charge that doesn't make it across the eighth of an inch or less to the wire - especially through the humid air around the slightly damp bristles - isn't likely to make it through the cartridge into your system either. (Anyway, experimentation proves that it doesn't, at least in my system.) -- Jerry decvax!yale-comix!leichter leichter@yale