The Apollo Masters plant in Banning, Calif., burned down on Feb. 6, eliminating the sole U.S. source of the blank lacquer master disks engineers cut on special lathes to create vinyl records.
Manufacturing with the volatile lacquer used in the record business has become a concern of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and it’s unknown yet if Apollo will be allowed to rebuild.
“Mastering engineers cut the blank disks on a revolving turntable and they then are sent off to be electroplated in a bath of nickel and silver,” according to Jean Lotus for UPI. “The metalized master is pressed into a negative metalized stamper mold, which is used to press vinyl plastic into records at one of the few remaining record plants in the United States. The special sapphire styli used on the revolving mastering lathes were also produced by Apollo.”
Source: https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2020/02/20/Vinyl-record-production-hurt-by-California-factory-fire/4601582093769/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=TopNews2020Feb20&utm_content=TopNews2020Feb20+CID_bd7fe66b2079c8068afd38a7a581c75d&utm_source=CM
What a pity. 🙁