Rid yourself of the muck in your mixer.

This question isn't exactly technical in nature, but even the simple things are worth covering if they affect audio pros... Tony writes:

"I just acquired a Yamaha 02R mixer which spent it's first year in 24 hour-a-day service (a television station) and it's 2nd, 3rd, and 4th years in the basement under some old VCRs (apparently it was replaced with a Wheatstone console). As far as I can tell everything works fine. My problem is that I can't remove all of the old masking tape that the previous owners used to mark the channels. I've used water to get some of it off, but a lot of it seemed to have melted with the heat and hardened. How can I remove the sticky residue without removing the paint and silkscreened letters?"

Similar to this topic is our Tech Tip from 05/19/98 which had to do with synth care. The operative phrase here is "safe for plastics" - as in, NOT a solvent. Solvents can eat right through plastic and silkscreened lettering. Plastic is found as part of many components of audio equipment these days, including the all-important switches, so don't dissolve your gear! Use a glass cleaner, or a solution designed specifically for cleaning plastics. These may not work 'like magic,' but they won't erode your 02R, either. If the grime is exceedingly stubborn, you may have to attack it a few times with the cleaner to get the majority of it removed.

One of our Sales Engineers (thanks Matt Mylroie!) also suggests using adhesive remover, which is readily available from medical supply stores and works GREAT for this type of job. It's very "gentle" as it was designed for contact with skin, and works great at removing sticky and filmy residue (and it usually has a nice citrus smell too!).