Cutting into lacquers is an older method of mastering for vinyl
records, but still has many supporters and fans. This analogue mastering
technique is widely accepted and used thanks to bigger number of
lacquer cutting lathes available and the tradition of lacquer mastering
through the years.
Hundreds of various lathes were produced during the golden era of
vinyl records between the 50s and 80s and many of them are still
operable. The softer lacquer material allows very high cutting levels
resulting in very loud records, but with risk of various distortions and
mistracking on some turntables. Lacquer cutting requires well trained
engineers and years of experience to create the best sounding vinyl
records.
The audio signal is transcribed into a master plate called lacquer
through a dedicated cutting head comprised of two moving coils
perpendicular to each other – one for the left and one for the right
channel. Movements of both coils are transferred to a cutting stylus
with a sharp triangular tip on the end. The stylus for cutting into soft
lacquer is heated and is made out of sapphire or ruby gems and cuts a
spiral V-shaped sound groove into a nitrocellulose layer covered on an
aluminium disc. Stampers for record pressing are manufactured from such
mastered lacquers by a three step electroforming process in electrolytic
baths. It is recommended to start these processes with already cut
lacquers as soon as possible to avoid deformations of grooves caused by
heat and other environmental factors.
The advantages of lacquer cutting are that a hicker lacquer layer
allows for bigger vertical amplitudes, which can carry more out-of-phase
low frequency signals (e.g. a bass guitar or a kick drum placed only in
one channel), but with higher risk of mistracking. They also allow
wider and deeper grooves which are more tolerant for most kinds of
surface damage and offer a little bit higher resistance for skipping
caused by badly calibrated turntables. However, very wide and deep
grooves can cause issues in the subsequent galvanic and pressing
processes. It often results in higher noise and more crackles and pops.
Lacquers deteriorate over time, hence we prefer that lacquers are cut
and processed in the shortest possible time frame. If you have your
lacquers produced by your own engineers and supply them to us for
plating, please ensure that these are sent to us quickly (in
coordination with our projects team) and insist on adequate packing and
labelling. Long journeys and wrong storage during transport is
detrimental to the final quality of the pressing. We don’t accept
liability for the inferior quality of test pressings resulting from
improper handling of lacquers. We advise you send us backup WAV files
with every lacquer.
