How to clean Audio Faders

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Over time, audio faders get dry and dirty, this results in scratchy faders that after a while will start to fail. In this video, I clean an Audio Fader the hard way, by disassembling it and cleaning each component one by one.
The back story.
I bought an Akai DPS16 and while it was in relatively good condition, both physically and cosmetically, the faders (ALPS RS Series) were dried out and scratchy and some weren't working at all. So I decided to replace them, the only problem being that none of the big electronics stores stocked these exact faders and there was no real way to modify new faders to work either. So this left me with only one option, to disassemble them, clean them and then reassemble them. This video was taken on one of the last faders I cleaned and I go through the process I went through.
This is not a definitive guide, I am sure there are many that may argue the procedure and obviously doing this to your own faders is at your own risk. This said, all my faders came out perfect and faders that were not working before came back to life and work perfectly, so the process has worked for me.
If you enjoyed this, please like and subscribe. I restore and repair a lot of vintage gear so i'll be uploading more videos as I finish these projects.
Here are some of the items I used in the video:
CAIG DeoxIT Faderlube F5S-H6 - tinyurl.com/y3esz4cp
Servisol Super 10 - tinyurl.com/yxnqmlby
The music is my own, you can listen to more here - / ianholdendc

Опубликовано:

21 сен 2020

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Комментарии : 33

@petercornell2002 3 года назад

Hey Ian, great video, thanks.

@bazoozoo5 3 месяца назад

remarkable. i am in nearly exactly the same situation with a pv10 mixer. im going out to buy the materials to clean the faders tomorrow and will loosely follow your method

@Dannys.channel 2 года назад

Thanks for the video you did a good job

@hardyardrecords 3 года назад

This is great thanks Ian!

@hardyardrecords 3 года назад

Also, the soundtrack is fire!

@Mattvandeventer 3 года назад

Awesome!

@francispanic 3 года назад

Thanks for this great video! Would you consider applying some grease to the housing to give to fader some resistance? I have recently cleaned faders on my Juno 60 (not as thoroughly as in this video) but they now seem to have lost a sense of their smoothness.

@proaudiorestore8926 3 года назад

You really need to look at either Servisol Super 10 or DeOxit FaderLube, they are specifically designed for lubing faders. What did you use to clean them before? And my experience, if you want your faders to be as silky smooth as it was before, you need to open it to get the crud out. Spraying them while they are closed will only get you so far.

@francispanic 3 года назад

@@proaudiorestore8926 Thanks for the reply. I used Deoxit F5 and like you guessed, sprayed through onto the fader while they were closed. My plan now is to do a more thorough job. But i think the F5 Faderlube may not provide that smooth resistance that was there in the first place, and i wondered if some sort of grease will have been used by the manufacturer. I'll follow the steps in this video and see how they feel from there, thanks!

@proaudiorestore8926 3 года назад

@@francispanic they will feel a lot smoother, well the best they can for their condition, but they won’t feel new. DeOxit do have fader grease that you can use for the last step and personally, if I was restoring Juno faders, it’s what I would use. You’ll only get one or two shots at best, so may as well do the best job you can. Good luck! caig.com/deoxit-grease-landing/

@francispanic 3 года назад

@@proaudiorestore8926 Thankyou!

@michaelj.podlovics2246 2 года назад

@@francispanic - I believe you are looking for a dampening grease. Nyogel 767A is an example and can be used to give faders, pots that tactile feel & weight. Don't apply the grease to the conductive track, just to the metal casing where the plastic glider comes in contact with it.

@wilhamcobly3805 Год назад

I put them in a ultrasound cleaner, water and isopropil. 8 minutes. Air spray. Done.

@proaudiorestore8926 Год назад

Agreed, I have a ultrasonic cleaner I use for vinyl cleaning that I would probably employ for this task now. That said, not many people have ultrasonic cleaners. Do you lube them up once the they are dry?

@janplexy 3 месяца назад

You replace them! That’s how.

@proaudiorestore8926 3 месяца назад

Read the notes 😉 if you can find the faders I’ll happily replace them. It would’ve saved me a ton of effort

@tommyvons1 2 года назад

a candle has fallen on my presonus studiolive 16.4.2 spilling wax (mostly faders 9-16 bus' and main) any ideas how to clean it out?

@proaudiorestore8926 2 года назад

Without taking the desk apart it’s going to be hard. Heat will get rid of the wax but if its leaked into the fader housing, it may limit the amount of connectivity that can be made. They are motorized so they are quite a bit more challenging than the faders in the video. I remember there being a video on YT on how to clean motorized faders but your mileage may vary. Just easiest to replace the whole thing fader and tbh. I only made this video because I couldn’t source new faders, but if I could’ve, it’s easiest just to replace them.

@galwaytribesman9289 2 года назад

I have an ensoniq sq80 synthesizer and I'm getting no reading for volume on the display screen the slders are broken too I'm wondering what the problem is

@proaudiorestore8926 2 года назад

The multi encoder on my Ensoniq EPS16 values were jumping around a lot. I cleaned both encoders the same way and it helped. The faders have seen many years of use though so there’s only so much you can do with cleaning. I see that there are some replacement faders on eBay so that’s probably a better route to take, you’ll get better results. I’m assuming the SQ80 and EPS16 faders are similar though.

@galwaytribesman9289 2 года назад

@@proaudiorestore8926 Yes similar I have two sliders on mine one for volume and one one for data entry or level both of them are sliding but no display is coming up on the screen for either. I wonder is it the potentiometers themselves or some other problem in the unit. Also my battery is very low and needs to be replaced. I'm wondering would that have anything to do with it.

@proaudiorestore8926 2 года назад

@@galwaytribesman9289 no idea but the faders and the battery are an easy fix so it’s a good place to start.

@galwaytribesman9289 2 года назад

@@proaudiorestore8926 Do you do Synth repairs man. Are you based in Ireland.

@proaudiorestore8926 2 года назад

@@galwaytribesman9289 I do and I am, but I am based in Dublin so a bit of a drive from Galway. Ping me on ianholdendc@gmail.com.

@kyloxyloto 3 года назад

Howsit Ian. Can you use the same method to clean D-Command faders?

@proaudiorestore8926 3 года назад

Kyle Koekemoer it’s not as easy. Here’s a guide - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-iACS9AELf4s.html

@Dannys.channel 2 года назад

Why didn’t you just use a dust cover at the beginning or use the air cans it techs use for computers this is so much work

@proaudiorestore8926 2 года назад

Unfortunately the grime is too ingrained to blast out with air and not really following on your comment about the dust cover? Generally the easy way is to clean out the faders with deoxit spray or just replace them, but the deoxit spray wasn’t cutting it and you can’t find replacement faders, so they needed to be dismantled. Trust me, if there was an easier way, I would’ve done it 😂 this is generally the last resort.

@Tony.Technics.1200s 11 месяцев назад

Ya, most times you can get away with not taking everything apart. If the faders are really nasty though , then you’re better off disassembling everything’s and starting from scratch. I wouldn’t recommend using the compressed air on faders, since you don’t know what’s directly under the fader, and you don’t want that nasty gunk flying on to a neighboring board and causing another problem.

@AbdulQadir-1818 Год назад

If carbon erased?

@proaudiorestore8926 Год назад

Then the fader would be dead I would suspect. If you're creative you may be able to cannibalise fader parts from another fader but it would probably be easier to scour the net to find a replacement. What is the fader for?

@janplexy 3 месяца назад

You replace them! That’s how.