[ARSCLIST] Recording Disc Preservation/Off-gassing?

[steven austin <stevena@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Greetings.

I'd like to post two inquiries; this is the first.

I have been collecting acetates for a while now. Sometime back in the
early 1990s, I came across a box of the plastic outer sleeves with flaps
that were used by Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs to package their products.
So, I put all my acetates into these sleeves and filed them away in the
stacks.

Last week (maybe ten years after I put them in the plastic sleeves), I
was moving some shelves and discovered that all these sleeves had
puckered and the acetates were stuck to the sleeves with a light sheen
of tacky goo, not much more sticky than a Post-It. However, the surfaces
of the discs now all have a pattern from where the goo met the pucker,
so to speak. All the clear plastic sleeves showed a yellow-orange ghost
of the disc.

One exception: if the acetate was in a paper sleeve inside the plastic
sleeve, there was no tackiness or pattern on the disc. The yellow-orange
ghost of the disc, however, still appeared on the plastic sleeve. I
could not be sure there was no discoloration of the several paper
sleeves because they were a kraft color originally.

Also, the reactions seemed to be contained within the plastic sleeves. I
saw no evidence that the sleeves reacted to poly bagged records in the
cases where they were stored side-by-side. The plastic sleeves in
question had flaps that, in the press of the stacks, would make them
virtually air-tight envelopes.

I panicked. (Librarians and archivists proceed with caution from here
on.) I used cool tap water and a bit of non-allergenic soap with a
cotton t-shirt to try gently to remove the goo and the patterns from one
of the few PVC test pressings that had been stored in one of these
sleeves. The goo went away for the most part after two washings, but the
patterning stayed, along with a bit of tackiness. Completing this feeble
test, I put a hold on my efforts until I could do more research.

I'm theorizing that the sleeve off-gassed and created a chemical
reaction inside the sealed envelope, and the tackiness is the residue.
The patterning reflected the puckering of the sleeve (imagine bubble
wrap). This worked the same way on both acetates and PVC records. But,
if either were in paper sleeves, nothing happened, even if the sleeve
puckered like all the others and the yellow-orange ghost was transferred
to the plastic sleeve.

Educated archivists would never make such a mistake, but perhaps someone
has experienced something similar; perhaps cleaning up after a donor's
similar mistake?

I would appreciate any advice that might suggest how to proceed in the
removal of the goo and the patterning. I'll test any reasonable
suggestions on my least dear victim.

Thank you.

Steven Austin