Scuff on record

[Rick Barber]

Well maybe more like a major size scratch. There is a semi circular scratch that is hitting about three tracks of the recording I am working on. It translates into a chirping sound through out most of the three tracks. In fact the scuff/scratch crosses the track twice on each rotation. And of course it is in the middle of the audio spectrum. There are examples of this scuff in the lead in grove so I can copy in the CNF. It works to get rid of the scuff but destroys the audio I want to keep.

Should I spend a lot of time trying to rescue this record or look for another copy of the album and start over? Finding another copy could be difficult because this was part of a fundraiser for a regional High School back in the mid 60's. This is one I my personal collection and now I guess I know why I have never attempted to restore this one. Side one of this is complete and was fairly easy to do.

[Craig Maier]

I would have to hear and see a sample of the scuff. Send a sample to me at:

dctools@aol.com

Make it around 10 seconds in length.

Craig

[Rick Barber]

Sent just now at 4:22 pm central.
Thanks again.

[Craig Maier]

Rick,

OK - I will go and get that file and get back to you asap.

Craig

[Craig Maier]

Rick,

I think that the following settings of the EZ Clean filter do a reasonable job. Give them a try and let me know what you think:

Scratch: 83.2
Crackle: 45.6
Hiss: 4

Craig

[Rick Barber]

One of the emails did not go through. While your recomendation seemed to work on one end of the file. (which was the one you received) the other end had much greater problems. That is the end I am trying to fix with out hurting the lead in area.

I re sent the email this morning with a little less time in it. Hopefully you will get it.

And look out, it is snowing in chicago right now. I have gotten about 6" of snow since 4 am this morning. And it is still coming down fast.

[Geebster]

And look out, it is snowing in chicago right now. I have gotten about 6" of snow since 4 am this morning. And it is still coming down fast.

Hey Rick... You can keep the stuff. We were supposed to get it too (I'm about 100 mi. due east of you), but we are still getting rain.

I don't mind rain, but I don't like the white lumpy stuff too well.

GB

[Craig Maier]

Hi again, Rick,

That sure is a strange noise on the record lead-in; never heard one like that before. Anyway, I pretty much got it with the following settings of the EZ Clean Filter - - -

Scratch: 100 (Amazing! Never before needed to run it that high)

Crackle: 62

Hiss: 15

Craig

[DougMac]

Hi again, Rick,

Anyway, I pretty much got it with the following settings of the EZ Clean Filter - - -

Scratch: 100 (Amazing! Never before needed to run it that high)

Crackle: 62

Hiss: 15

Craig

Craig,
When you ran the scratch at that high a setting, did you get distortion?

I'm putting together a novelty Christmas CD for my son's boss made up of some obscure entries ("Boogie Woogie Sanata Claus", "Santa Claus Is a Black Man") as well as the better known novelty records. I was restoring my 45 copy of "The Chipmunk Song" that I bought in 1958. Eight year olds aren't known for their record preservation skills, so my copy has some scratches. I found when using the EZ filter, raising the scratch level too high introduces distortion. Best results was a compromise setting that removed most of the noise without introducing artifacts. A little manual interpolation of the biggest clicks rendered an acceptable copy.

Doug

[Craig Maier]

Quoting Doug:

"Craig,
When you ran the scratch at that high a setting, did you get distortion?"

-------------------------------------------

I did not get distortion in this case, although usually I do with extreme settings like that.

But this is a special case in that Rick's file was recorded very low with the average signal being down at around - 35dB. The "scuffing" sounds were higher in level at around - 15 dB peak. So, the extreme setting of the "Scratch" filter did not produce distortion; it just got rid of the "scuffing" sounds.

It is an interesting case!

[Rick Barber]

There was distorsion in some of the track after running it. I thing I am going to try to get another record or maybe try recording it wet.

[Craig Maier]

I would not recommend running the entire record with that setting; just run the scuff area selectively that way and it should be ok from what I can tell based on a small sample piece of the file.

[Craig Maier]

Rick,

Here is another idea. The scuff noise was visually very obvious on the time domain display. So, just use selective filtering (see the users manual for details pertaining to this approach) on those areas alone using the EZ Clean Filter settings that I recommended. That way, there will be no real distortion introduced into the piece.

[Rick Barber]

Selective filtering? Thats a new one on me. I will dig out the manual. Been a while since I looked at it anyway.

For the record (no pun intended) those noises/scratches/scufs/whatever extend through about half of the track. The track is almost 5 minutes long.

I contacted my sister and she has a copy of that ablum also. She will send it to me as soon as she finds it.

[Craig Maier]

Selective filtering is a wonderful tool to understand and use for difficult audio restoration projects. It allows you to apply any filter or effect to a selected portion of a wavefile rather than the entire file.