Dealing with Static on LP palyback

Spatial, you wrote, "As for static, I did a tough test.  I played the treated record without the static draining tonearm brush and at the end of playing, there was no static.  Zero, non-whatsoever."

I have a few questions, but please know that I do not mean to be contentious. I pretend that we are all sitting in the same room and are friends having a conversation. No animus here.

First, how do you test for or measure static charge?  Second, did you also do the experiment with an untreated LP and no "static draining" brush in the same room on the same TT?  If so, what did you observe? I have no basis to doubt that Gruv Glide might protect from static charge build up due to the many other causes, but I do very much doubt that static charge build up happens due to stylus/vinyl friction.

I recently got out my ES meter to observe what happens as I play an LP.  I focused the meter on an LP as the stylus traversed the surface from outer edge to label.  The meter has to be held within one inch of a surface to be read, so doing it with a rotating LP was a bit tricky.  Anyway, first I induced a charge on the LP by yanking it from its sleeve, which by the way was not paper but that translucent bag used by Polydor and some others.  My meter read -18,000V (!!!). Then I discharged the LP with my Zerostat, which got it down to around -100V, just as it usually does.  Then I played that LP and used the meter to follow in the tracks of the stylus. The reading bounces around quite a bit but never exceeds a value between say -100V and -200V.  When I focused the meter ahead of the stylus, i.e., grooves that had not yet been reached by the stylus, the readings were wildly variable but always below -100V and I also saw that the sign of the reading (plus or minus) was bouncing around.  (Since we all agree that vinyl attracts negative ions and so develops a negative charge, a positive voltage reading is not important.) So I thought maybe something is happening here, because of the slight differences in the readings after the stylus has passed by vs before the stylus has reached a groove. When the stylus reached the innermost grooves, I lifted it off the LP and read the LP surface.  Zilch.  Nothing above background. In fact, if anything, the readings were lower (less negative) than -100V. So IF there is something happening locally as the stylus passes over grooves, it never accumulates and is very quickly dissipated and certainly never reaches levels of charge remotely in the same range as it does with removing it from its sleeve. I need to repeat this experiment with different LPs because maybe the vinyl formulation makes a difference.  I have one LP that failed to charge up when I yanked it from its paper sleeve, even after 3 tries.

@lewm I'll try to answer all your questions - 

When I found static on he LP, I could hear it crackle and pop as I picked the LP up.  During playing I could hear a constant snap and crackle quietly in the background.  This is unlike a click or a pop from a damaged record or perhaps a dirty one. 

Gruv Glide has you do a test - play a track several times to become familiar with it, then treat it, and play it again.  Untreated I had static, post treatment I had no static and it sounded noticeably better.  

The static removing camel hair tonearm brush isn't conductive, in spite of the claims by the manufacturer.  All the static removing manual brushes I have are conductive in the range of kOhms.  The tonearm brush is more than 20 Gig Ohms.   If this reduces static, then I don't see how.  The manufacturer told me to wash it in soap and water, then rinse, and dry it. I did, but it is still non conductive.  I also rinsed it in a solution of fabric softener, thinking that might help conductivity.  It did not but then I only added a drop to an ounce of water.  Frankly, I question the claims the manufacturer makes about static.  At $300+ it "should" do a great job at static!  It does, however, do a great job picking up any dust, so I continue to use it.  

I don't have an static meter or any way of measuring static.  I can tell you that sometimes the static was so bad, the hair on my arm prickled up before I got to the record.  

I'm not making any claims on how the static got there- - I've read all the previous posts.I only claim static was present before and not after the Gruv Glide treatment, plus the sound quality was better.

Spatial, thanks for your responses.

i am not sure that the conductivity of your brush, or lack thereof, means it could not do a good job of removing ES charge from the surface of an LP, because ES charge is purely a surface phenomenon. We know that vinyl develops a negative surface charge because it attracts negative ions but it does not conduct that charge. If it did there would be no net increase in charge on its surface. Also the charge is not “in” the vinyl; it’s “on” the vinyl, else it would not be so easily created and removed. To neutralize ES charge, we bring the charged surface in proximity to another surface that is positively charged or has the property of taking on the negative ions from the LP surface. Then zap, the two surfaces instantly or very rapidly become neutral, as in a lightening strike.

Lightning, not “lightening.” Autocorrect is frightening.