The Secret Society of Lathe Trolls

Flo - thanks much for that info, and congratulations on the very major accomplishment of creating new DMM-spec compatible cutting systems and lathes! Do you have any info up on the web on these new systems?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Greetings fellow Trolls - I have updated the design and the lists I have up on my website for vinyl record pressing plants around the world. To the best of my knowledge what I have listed are actual vinyl record manufacturers who do pressing at their own facilities, and does NOT include brokers who ...

With the total loss from the fire at the Apollo Masters facility, one source for vinyl mastering that will not be directly affected by lacquer master disc supply disruptions that should manifest in a few months (apart from likely getting slammed with new orders) is Direct Metal Mastering, as DMM stu...

(my credentials regarding the answers above is that I was the last mastering engineer to commercially cut DMM masters - at Europadisk, 2004-05, and previous to that was a production manager at Europadisk for a number of years) Didn't see a way of editing posts here - but to be clear my post meant t...

You need a VMS-82 to cut DMM. To the very best of my knowledge, VMS-70 has NEVER been used to cut DMM. From my understanding the VMS-82 has higher torque and stability for its drive than the VMS-70 - needed for the extra weight of the DMM discs using copper plated steel substrates (instead of lacque...

thanks for the corrections everybody - I am going to remove Chinaetech from the list.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Greetings Lathe Trolls - Just a note that I did a major update to my list of what to the best of my knowledge is all the actual vinyl record pressing plants in the world - with a number of plants opening this past year in Canada, USA, China, Taiwan, Korea, Brazil, Austria, France, Sweden, etc. - ama...

Just updated the list with the new international plants I could confirm as currently taking orders - Denmark, Vietnam, France, China, all adding one. New US plants in Philadelphia PA and Austin TX are expected to come online in the next few months. If people have names and locations of more confirme...

Ireland - seems one of those is a broker, and MLV's website url goes to an expired domain. Does anyone know if MLV is still in business?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Aussie0zborn - do you know the names and locations of these? Verified to be actually pressing and not brokers?
Is RIP-V the one in Canada you were referring to? I thought they had closed and sold their presses to another Canadian plant - but did they reopen?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Greetings fellow Trolls - Just did an update of the list of all verified actual pressing plants in the globe to reflect the following changes - 2 new US plants opened this year - "Kindercore" in Athens, Georgia with 3 new Viryl Warm Tone presses - taking orders now and planning to ship its first rec...

Mark - thanks so much for your reply and info!

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Greetings fellow Trolls: Been a bit since I posted last, but as it looks like my mastering schedule is going to be a little lighter than usual the next couple of weeks I was wanting to put in some time towards my embarrassingly long procrastinated on project of restoring a Fairchild 523 record lathe...

Greetings fellow Trolls - Just a note that the long running list of verified vinyl record pressing plants (that to the best of my knowledge does not include any brokers but only those plants that press in-house) hosted on my website was finally updated after a 2 and a 1/2 year lapse. Big thanks to M...

Thanks for posting that! - an excellent film even just on a cinematic level - but the content definitely made it more interesting to me as well.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Very cool - I'll make it a point to stop by and say hello. It'd be fun to meet for drinks or a show during some of your off-time as well. Contact info is up at http://www.totalsonic.net

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Awesome Steve. How is your 523 project going? Anderson It's been going very poorly - lol! A couple years of procrastination / being busy with other stuff followed by a couple years of moving to a new town and re-setting up my studio - at the same time as becoming a father for the first time - has m...

Finally got around to scanning the manual I have for the Fairchild 523. This is for the original 523-J1 model from 1948 - which was 2 speed (33-1/3 & 78) and had manually continuously adjustable LPI between 80 to 160 LPI. I have a later unit (serial #141 which I believe is from the early 50's) which...

Finally got around to scanning the manual I have for the Fairchild 523. This is for the original 523-J1 model from 1948 - which was 2 speed (33-1/3 & 78) and had manually continuously adjustable LPI between 80 to 160 LPI. I have a later unit (serial #141 which I believe is from the early 50's) which...

some good news in terms of possibly making at least a small dent in the current long turn times for anyone wanting to get vinyl records pressed - small plants are opening in Vermont and Oregon:

http://www.factmag.com/2015/06/01/two-vinyl-pressing-plants-open-vermont-oregon/