"Geoffrey S. Mendelson" wrote in
:

On another list we have been discussing using Caig DeOxit on pots
(e.g. Volume, balance, etc controls).

Caig has another product called "Fader Lube", which I assume is
designed for such a use.

The question I have is has anyone used the regular DeOxit on such
controls and the results? A web search yielded many hits of people
using DeOxit and having good results, and even a YouTube videos of it.

It's hard to tell from the postings, and the videos, how many the
people posting have done. Some of them are obviously people who have
done one or two, and others are not. I'm interested in hearing long
term experience.

Thanks in advance,

Geoff.


Decades ago, I met an old organ repair technician at a Roland tech
seminar to become a certified Roland repair station. Most of the rest of
the participants were much younger than us, so we gravitated together and
had lunch.

I was spending a fortune each year buying products like DeOxit to clean
organ controls, the thousands of metal to metal contacts before
everything became conductive rubber. Talking about the price of this
stuff, which would make you think a pharmaceutical company produced it in
a lab, he said something to me that simply shocked me.

"Hell, you're wasting your money on all that crap. I've been cleaning
hifi, PA and organ contacts with WD40, which is very cheap and easy to
find without going to the most expensive electronic repair company and
paying their exhorbitant prices. I've been doing it for lots of years
with no returns or complaints. I think because it leaves a lube residue
on anything it touches the contacts stayed cleaner because they weren't
exposed to the moisture in the air."

We both had to fight the horribly humid coastal swamp gas we live in, he
in NC and I in SC. So, I had some old organs that were just awful coming
up so I tried it. I used WD40 ever since with fantastic results. It
makes a 40 year old, almost worn out expression pedal pot work like new
with audio as smooth as glass. Some of those pots are nearly unobtanium
because of their queer shafts and mountings.

Another nice thing about WD40 is its effects upon dragging or frozen pot
bearings, of course. One drop in a pot bearing and you wonder why noone
did it instead of twisting off the knob!

The new WD40 isn't even flammable any more. I'm still using it, but now
that I'm retired not so often...(c;]

Try it on something really nasty and see for yourselves. Crap on this
$20-40 a can nonsense. The cleaners are more expensive than a new pot!

......available at fine hardware emporiums, worldwide.....
.....and WalMart!

If it'll make you feel better, buy it from Ace Hdwe and pay double.