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Re: [GBW] Scotch tape?
If I recall correctly, the Scotch tape was applied to the Dead Sea Scrolls when such tape was still a fairly new invention and considered the greatest thing since sliced bread. This example is a lesson to all of us, not necessarily to spurn all new inventions but to think them through carefully and assess the risks.
As to the pH pen. Remember that pH--acidity and alkalinity--is by definition a factor only of acqueous solutions. The pH pen can provide a rough-and-ready measurement of paper because of the moisture in paper ("dry" paper typically contains 4-8% water) and the moisture in the pen itself. Plastics and acrylic adhesives, such as those used on modern self-adhesive tapes, are not aqueous solutions and therefore have no pH. A pH pen used on these materials is probably measuring the pH of the residue on the pen from a recent test of something else. When a vendor describes a plastic or a non-aqueous adhesive as "acid-free," they are using this legally meaningless term as a shorthand for something like "this material has properties that some consider make it longer lasting and/or less actively harmful in common archival applications than other similar materials now available or used in the past."
When I teach basic book repair to managers of school and public libraries, I always advise: use ANY self-adhesive tape (including the "archival" tapes) with the assumption that it will not be possible to remove it cleanly or cheaply in the future. While the acrylic adhesives now used on archival tapes are much more stable/less likely to yellow or fail than other tape adhesives, they grip more and more strongly over time. Eventually they become very difficult to remove-especially if the tape has been applied to brittle or friable paper, to friable media, or media that is fugitive in organic solvents. A school library may be fine with the decision to use self-adhesive tape on a book that will be discarded within 20 years; a private collector may not want to use the tapes on their investments.
--
Shannon Zachary
Preservation & Conservation
University Library, University of Michigan
________________________________
From: Chuck%20%26%20Joanne%20Videto <videto@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: The email list for Guild of Book Workers member communications <gbw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2009 17:34:47 -0500
To: <gbw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [GBW] Scotch tape?
I just read an article in "The Manuscript Society News" (XXIX No. 4, 2008) where in it stated that they re-assembled some of the Dead Sea Scrolls using... Scotch tape!!!!
As outrageous as that sounds it called to mind a Brodart brochure on book repair, (circa 1990), where on the subject of page repair, it says " always use Magic Transparent Tape- celluloid tape will dry out and yellow." ( page 7)
We've all had to deal with the nasty effects of tape indiscriminately used on torn pages.
But if the article from the Manuscript society is correct it makes me wonder if those people were brain dead or perhaps there's more merit to the Brodart reference than I thought.
I tried testing some tape with a ph pen but it was inconclusive. I just thought I'd put this sticky topic out there for discussion.
Charles Videto
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