Apollo factory fire

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Brian Roth

Well-known member
Joined
Aug 20, 2005
Messages
3,633
Location
Salina Kansas
Just got this link from a friend who is involved in reissuing vinyl records:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/three-alarm-building-fire-in-banning-blocks-highway-243-businesses-evacuated-due-to-chemical-concerns/ar-BBZJ7X4

Won't be an impact to the vast majority of members on this list, but I know Paul Gold and maybe a couple other members cut lacquer masters for disc pressing.

Apollo  has/had the vast majority of the world's market for production of lacquer blanks.

https://www.apollomasters.com/

Bri


 
Really bad. I'm hoping that the fire was somewhat contained to the chemical storage area and the manufacturing equipment and completed discs were elsewhere.
 
ANNOUNCEMENT
To all our wonderful customers. It is with great sadness we report the Apollo Masters manufacturing and storage facility had a devastating fire and was completely destroyed. The best news is all of our employees are safe. We are uncertain of our future at this point and are evaluating options as we try to work through this difficult time. Thank you for all of the support over the years and the notes of encouragement and support we have received from you all.

Apollo Masters
Click to expand...
 
Other recent articles:

https://www.analogplanet.com/content/major-vinyl-production-catastrophe-apollotransco-lacquers-burns

https://www.analogplanet.com/content/abbey-road-mastering-engineer-miles-showell-comments-apollotransco-disaster

A very ugly situation since vinyl releases have been on an upswing while CD releases are dropping.  Many folks will just shrug their shoulders, but as one of my correspondents emailed me:

"There is an entire industry at stake here and hundreds of millions of dollars of investment by hundreds of companies."

Millions of $$$ of investments the past several years isn't chump change.

Bri
 
The effects are already being seen.... :eek:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Beatles-INSANELY-RARE-Original-1967-ADAPTED-SGT-PEPPER-Cover-Showing-CAPITOL/184156452790?_trkparms=aid%3D333200%26algo%3DCOMP.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D225074%26meid%3Ddc1b05269e074c5787e224ddeb02759d%26pid%3D100229%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D12%26sd%3D202895909924%26itm%3D184156452790%26pmt%3D0%26noa%3D1%26pg%3D2053904&_trksid=p2053904.c100229.m3211
 
I spoke with George Alexandrovich yesterday about this and he said that the equipment was damaged.  He has been getting all sorts of work modifying heads and styli to cut on copper.

Mike
 
sodderboy said:
He has been getting all sorts of work modifying heads and styli to cut on copper.
Click to expand...

By the time someone converts a lacquer lathe to DMM lacquer blanks should be available.  There are multiple hurtles to using copper.

Good luck sourcing copper blanks. Most DMM lathes are at pressing plants that have the electroplating facilities needed
To make the blanks.

Just getting the chip to pick up is difficult. The VMS82 modulated vacuum pressure with groove depth. That would take some time to design and implement.

Now the whole industry rests on an old man making lacquers in his garage. This has to change. And change it will.
 
LA Times article the other day.  Sounds like the Japanese maker is at full capacity and taking no new clients.
 
It will take a while to sort out but there need to be three or four suppliers so this doesn’t happen again.  At least there is the market space for a few smaller operations to get going and have captive customers to try them out.
 
I'm a "fly on the wall" here in Kansas with the QRP record pressing plant and the Doug Sax lathe system, but I pay attention.

Chris Muth is a friend who susses out various lathe probs (and finds solutions which I admire....I'm NOT a lathe guy!).  Rolling Stone has some recent quotes from Chris:

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/vinyl-industry-apollo-masters-fire-951903/

Another recent story from the LA Times:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/how-a-fire-in-the-inland-empire-could-spell-doom-for-the-worldwide-vinyl-lp-boom/ar-BB106qv1

I guess the larger music industry could care less about vinyl, but a lot of good people are still involved with all aspects of vinyl production.  And some customers buy vinyl....I thought I saw that Walmart is now selling vinyl!

Bri
 
Chris is probably the best lathe tech around. Especially the VMS 80/82 which not a lot of people have his experience with.

There are four disciples of Al Grundy of which we are two. Al knew a lot about lathes and cutting from a technical perspective.
 
This week was the fourth (?) time I had the pleasure of working with Chris.  I always watch and learn, while trying to be of assistance.  Over the past few years, I've learned where the "spare bones" are stashed at Blue Heaven!

Bri

 

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