Electrical cords can be a nuisance, whether in your home or in a museum collection. Over time they g

Electrical cords can be a nuisance, whether in your home or in a museum collection. Over time they get sticky, dirty and discolor before becoming stiff and even crumbly. Generally speaking, the culprit is the plastic insulation, which in many cases is polyvinyl chloride, better known as PVC. Unlike the rigid and durable PVC that you find in plumbing, siding, and window frames, flexible PVC is not nearly as stable. A complex process of physical and chemical degradation occurs within both the PVC polymer itself, and the additives that were introduced to alter its properties and make it more elastic. Unfortunately, once the process of degradation has started, it cannot be stopped, but only slowed down. There are several things that can be done to slow down this process, which is not only dangerous to the object itself, but can also catalyze deterioration in other nearby objects through off-gassing.First of all, we can control the environment in which these objects are kept. In the conservation field, this is called Preventive Conservation. There are numerous resources that explain Preventive Conservation including those on our own Tumblr blog. In short, this means that we limit agents of deterioration; limiting fluctuations in temperature and relative humidity, light and UV exposure, and if possible, isolating materials that might be harmful to others. Because electrical cords and their plastic insulation are part of objects that contain numerous materials, the PVC cannot be isolated. Instead, radios, phones, lamps, and other electronics are stored and displayed separately from object that can be affected by the plasticized PVC’s off-gassing of volatile chemicals. We can also “train” cords into positions that inhibit cracking and keep them free from tangling and sticking to anything they shouldn’t.Before training and during training photo of Mitchell Bobrick’s Control Light Table Lamp, ca. 1945, Glazed ceramic, enameled metal, spun fiberglass, Gift of the George R. Kravis II Collection. 2018.50.30.There are numerous ways to train and store cords depending on their length, age and level of degradation, and the materials at hand. The image above is the Bobrick lamp that was recently donated to the museum that is quite similar to the one in LACMA’s collection. As you can see, the cord is stable, albeit dirty, but is beginning to warp and harden. Since it is not sticky or actively crumbling, it was safe to re-train by gently wrapping around a 4” diameter acid-free tube. Over the course of two days it could be gently tightened. Once it could maintain this new shape, archival Mylar clasps were made to help the cord stay in its new shape without pinching. Before and after training of the cord on the Control Light Table cord.If you’re interested in reading more about the degradation of plastics, particularly in museum collections, this New York Times article is a great introduction.Posted by Sasha Drosdick -- source link

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