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Original Post Date: 18/11/2016

Dear PACCIN Colleagues,

We are amassing an ever-growing stock of acrylic/Plexi sheets, of varying sizes, ranging from 7.5” x 20” to 24” x 36”, to re-use for future framing projects (we frame objects from our collections for 4-5 month exhibitions and then unframe them afterwards). We have vertical shelving assigned for storing this Plexi stock.

Does anyone have suggestions for thin interleaving or wrapping material that would prevent the sheets from scratching each other when sliding them out, and which would not leave ghosting or residue if stored for years at a time? We have been taking out the scratched pieces that we couldn’t re-hab with scratch remover and cutting them into scraps for bending into props, but our scrap pile is… sufficient!

I have a call-in to our plexi vendor with this question, but also wanted your opinions as well.
I should note that we do have a lot of 4-ply matboard scraps to interleave, but storage space is very limited. I am considering 2-ply, and will not add masking back on to each piece because of cost and time, so any other suggestions that are as thin or thinner (even better) are much appreciated.

Thank you in advance,
Justin Luna
Senior Exhibitions Preparator

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I would suggest using some material that is already cut to a similar size. Glassine, tissue or newsprint could be ordered in cut sizes similar to your plex stock. Maybe tablets of drawing paper? Saves time and allows you to focus on more important tasks.

Steve
Chief Preparator

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Hi Justin,

In my time here we have almost entirely switched all our use to Optium Tru Vue Museum Acrylic. This stuff is expensive and I've amassed a lot of it in my 7 standard sizes. The 3 smaller sizes I store horizontal in unused Solender boxes (of which I maintain an overstock) and the larger sizes are stored vertically in 4-flap folders. Accessing the acrylic from a flat storage container avoids scuffing. Though it takes up additional space I interleave it with the blue board or Coroplast backing that it will be framed with. If I needed to save container space by using something thinner I'd use folder stock for the interleaving.

Best wishes,

Steve

Stephen Fixx
Conservation Technician