Caring for Cultural Material 1

Caring for Cultural Material 2

Damage and Decay

Managing Collections

Managing People

Handling, Transportation, Storage and Display

Glossary

Index

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Caring for Cultural Material 2
In this volume:
– Textiles
– Leather
– Wood
– Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Material
arrow Metals
– Outdoor Collections
– Acknowledgments
Metals
In this chapter:
– Objectives
– Introduction
– Metal objects in collections
– Common metals
– The nature of metals
– What are the most common types of damage?
– Common causes of damage
– Handling, storage and display guidelines
– Metals in Australia’s climatic zones
– Care of particular metals
– Silver
– Nickel silver
– Copper and copper alloys
– Iron and its alloys
– Plated iron
– Lead and pewter
– Tin and its alloys
– Aluminium
– Gold
  MORE ABOUT METALS
arrow Alloys
– Corrosion of metals
– Electroplate
– Zinc carbonate blotter
– Brasses
– Bronzes
– Iron and steel
– Bentonite paste
– Chloride ions and aluminium and its alloys
– Spot-tests
– For further reading
– Self-evaluation quiz
– Answers to self-evaluation quiz

 

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Metals

Alloys

All metals have physical properties—malleability, conductivity, strength, impact resistance and chemical reactivity. Their usefulness is determined by how these properties can be altered through alloying with other metals to produce a wide range of materials with tailor-made properties.

Alloying changes the corrosion resistance of the parent metal. Properties such as mechanical hardness and melting point also alter dramatically with alloying. The microstructure of alloys and metals is dependent on the rate at which they are cooled. This subsequently affects the rate of corrosion.

Mechanical working—such as hammering, drawing and rolling—also changes the microstructure of metals. If the stresses imparted to the metal are not relieved after fabrication, then stress corrosion can significantly diminish the service life of the materials.

An awareness of this behaviour in metals helps the conservator to respond in the most appropriate fashion to the various degradation problems that they find in collections.

 

 

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