P3D Re: Photo protectors by DF (Desmarais & Frère )?

[Bob Wier <wier@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Here's an interesting message from another list I'm on about
"archival" plastic...

--              Bob Wier
     mailto:wier@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
   4:06 PM Tuesday, March 31, 1998
   Rocky Mountain College, Billings MT.
 keeper of the Photo-3d and Overland-Trails
mailing lists and the USA GPS Waypoint server



--- begin forwarded text
|From: Michael McColgin <mimccol@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
|Subject: Re: Photo protectors by DF (Desmarais & Frère )?
|
|>Nancy F. Yellowknife NT Canada wrote
|>I have lots of photos stored in "Archival" (their quotes) quality
|>sheet protectors with honeycomb backing from this Montreal company
|>(Desmarais & Frère). Does anyone know if they are safe or how to
|>contact them?  The shop where I buy them couldn't help.
|
|	You can check you plastic quite easily.  Take an empty
|pickle/olive/canning glass jar and wash the jar and lid scrupulously clean.
|Dishwasher detergent is good. Then rinse in very hot water three times and
|dry in a rack. Dishtowels can introduce foreign stuff in your sterile jar,
|so don't use them. After the jar and lid are dry, cut one of the sheet
|protectors into chunks, place the chunks in the jar, and put on the lid
|tightly. Place the jar on a window ledge so it gets warm (heat increases
|deterioration) and gets sunlight (also increases deterioration). This is
|very low-tech accelerated aging.
|	After a few days, no longer than a week, you may notice that a film
|has formed on the inside of the jar. If such is the case, the plastic is
|not stable and you should not use it. You don't need to know what is
|volatilizing out of the plastic, just that something is. If there is no
|film, unscrew the lid and take a quick sniff. If you smell something
|reminiscent of the interior of a new, cheap car, something is volatilizing
|out of the plastic, so it is unsafe. If you see no film and smell nothing
|chemical-ly, the plastic is probably OK.
|
|Michael McColgin
|Preservation Officer
|Arizona State Archives



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