Permanent markers

I read the CURATOR article on pens with some interest, as we currently
use rapidographs to label artifacts, and these are expensive and
frequently get clogged.  On the advice of the Smithsonian (which does
everything right as we all know) we use a layer of soluvar acrylic
varnish on the artifact, write the number on the varnish, and then apply
a second, protective layer.  In practice this has been quite workable
and removable, except for the problem with the rapidographs.

We tried using the Pigma, but it refuses to write on the acrylic layer.
We have Sharpies here, but since the rapidograph ink is easily removable
when needed we decided to stick with it despite the aggravation.

Just count this a field report from the uninformed masses who do the
grunt work.  :-)

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 8:32
                 Distributed: Tuesday, November 1, 1994
                        Message Id: cdl-8-32-002
                                  ***