RECORD CLEANING – find a method which works for you
My fluid – which I’m now going to call Plane Groovy cleaning fluid – uses a combination of highest purity distilled water and isopropyl alcohol, plus a surfactant. The surfactant reduces surface tension and allows fluid to actually wet the surface and any attached particles. The water and alcohol combo serves two purposes; firstly to dissolve or soften any crud on the surface (just water is not as effective) and secondly to aid evaporation of any liquid residue on the surface (the alcohol dramatically increases the evaporation rate).
This fluid is effective for whichever cleaning method you use, as mentioned below. You can certainly reuse it if you’re using a “tank style” cleaning bath but I highly recommend filtering the solution after use before storing it, and bear in mind that the alcohol concentration will gradually reduce through evaporation.
The main advantage of the Plane Groovy fluid is that it’s really cost effective compared to other commercially available fluid!
Here is a Blog which discusses “easy” cleaning methods.
https://blog.discogs.com/en/how-to-clean-vinyl-records-the-easy-way/
I’d agree mostly with this comment (from the feedback to the article):
“In order of effectiveness it’s hand washing, Spin Clean, vacuum based system, ultrasonic. Thoroughly cleaning albums reduces a tremendous amount of background noise. New sleeves, especially Mofi and Diskeeper do a great job of eliminating most static.”
However, handwashing using microfibre cloths is pretty effective; these cloths do get low into the grooves and in my experience do a pretty good job of cleaning – particularly if you use one cloth for moving the crud after a first spray and then a different “clean” cloth after a further spray. Never mix the dirty and clean cloths, wash them regularly.
Currently I use a VPI 16.5 machine, which vacuums the fluid off the surface after cleaning. It’s an expensive but effective solution. Significantly cheaper, and potentially better could be ultrasonic cleaning.
Here’s some discussion about home-made ultrasonic machines (I’m experimenting with one of these very soon) and guidance on how to make one. I bought a 6 litre ultrasonic tank on eBay for about £80, plus a “3D printed” spindle kit to mount on top for around £100.
https://www.hifiwigwam.com/forum/topic/127148-homemade-ultrasonic-vinyl-cleaner/