Button Crumbs

[buttonsoldbuttons]

Have you ever opened a bag of buttons expecting to find wonderful old plastic buttons and found instead crackles and crumbs? I know what causes that and I know how to stop the damage from advancing to crumbs. The cause is old plastic and new plastic have a bad reaction. That is, bad for the old. The cure is baking soda. I have been doing some experimenting with buttons that are beyond hope. The baking soda mixed with a little water definitely does the trick I think it works with dry soda too but it is too soon to tell for sure. In the mean time get your buttons out of the plastic bags and containers separate the new plastics from the old ones and PLEASE help me to educate everyone else. We are losing so many beautiful buttons for such a stupid reason. Another equally discouraging effect of this chemistry is the button that is nearly curled over on itself. By the way it was a collector of old fishing lures who told me the cause they have apparently known this for years. I would appreciate hearing any of your feed back on this. Buttonsoldbuttons

[svengali]

Wow, this is interesting. How exactly do you use the baking soda to stop the problem? The problem is celluloid degradation which is caused by the inherent instability of celluloid itself, which lets off gasses which can "turn" other celluloids into crumbles. First stage is a fine crazing that some people mistake for an as-made feature of the button. The only "cure" I have ever heard of is to paint the crazed button with clear nail polish so it won't gas anymore and affect other celluloids. Here's an image of some celluloid problems we should all study and learn to recognize: http://www.vintagebuttons.net/celluloid/cellprob.jpg Yes, buttons should be separated and if you smell camphor in your plastic baggies full of buttons, there's celluloid buttons in the mix.

[buttonsoldbuttons]

What I have been doing and it is working it putting the celluloid buttons in a paste of water and baking soda usually for a couple of days since I do it and then get busy but I think overnight would be long enough. Do some experimenting yourself. I am now experimenting with just dry baking soda to see if that will work. I am just putting baking soda in a tin with a lid on it and dropping the buttons in there. It doesn't hurt the buttons like the water can but I am not yet sure how well it works. Anyway the baking soda helps keep the crackling from getting worse. I don't know what causes the discoloration, though I have been seeing that as well. I have been collecting for 20 years but my interest has always been in glass buttons. I just started doing some selling and I have had so many of these plastic buttons come in that are almost crumbs and lots of my customers are looking for these buttons. It is very frustrating to me. I hadn't heard of painting them with clear nail polish I suppose you have to completely cover them? It might be quicker but it does leave them covered in nail polish which I suppose would have an effect on their value? I know crazed buttons aren't as valuable as perfect ones anyway but seems like nail polish would further devalue them. Anyway it's a good thing to know about. Part of my frustration is also that it is taking so long for me to find out if the dry treatment is working or not and in the mean time I don't know how many buttons I'm losing in the process. I just came into an inventory that included hundreds of these celluloid buttons and I just about wept when I opened the boxes and found them packed with plastic baggies. I pulled the plastic out of the boxes dumped a box of baking soda in and closed them back up. I will see how they are doing in a few weeks when I have time to work with them again. I will keep you informed. Julie

[buttonsoldbuttons]

Hi, I went through the buttons I had in dry baking soda. When I opened the tin the camphor smell was gone. I did have a few buttons in there that weren't celluloid as a test. I think you should do some experimenting with it. If we can stop the damage with out having to paint them I think that would be better. I left them in the dry soda for a week and I didn't open the tin in between so I would be sure to notice if the smell was still with them. They also had a different feel to them which is hard to explain. You need to try it for yourself and then we need to educate people if you think it's worthwhile. I actually think the dry soda worked better than the paste did. Let me know what you think. Julie

[svengali]

Personally I woudn't try any test that required a celluloid button to be soaked in anything. Believe it or not, some of our antique celluloids did not get along with water at all and were always removed from the clothing before laundering. They were never meant to get wet. Most of the crysalization problem we see are in the fancy "hand tooled" celluloids from the late 1930's thru the 1950's, most often identified as Marion Weeber or "Weeber like" designs. These are beautiful works of art and once the celluloid deterioration starts, it's just a matter of time before the whole button is affected and begins to crumble apart. Painting them with clear nail polish does not stop the degradation either but it can keep the button intact longer than one would expect. This is not about killing the camphor smell. Celluloids will usually keep that smell for life. The destruction starts for several reasons (1) Being kept in tight tins, jars or boxes, celluloids need to breathe so the camphor fumes don't build up and start to destroy the button from within; (2) Close proximity to unrelated materials, such as metals; (3) Heat and humidity are damaging to delicate hand tooled celluloid buttons. I'm not saying your method of trying to cure celluloid disease is not valid although I have never heard of it being used before. Thanks for sharing but I highly recommend that we keep celluloid buttons out of water and this includes the hot water test so many peole use. If you want to know if it's celluloid, a hot pin test will tell the tale instantly. Celluloid will give a quick poof of smoke emitting that famous "camphor" smell and a small burn hole will be left behind. Test only on the back of buttons if this is your testing choice. If we see a test mark on the back of buttons that looks like this, no further testing is needed. You will know it's celluloid.

[caspiantern]

I appreciate this board so much and am learning. I try to check in each time I am online and see whats new! Thanks for all the good information. Where does one get the button boards I see displayed on Ebay? they look so nice with the buttons.

[smartypantz]

I am so amazed at what I have learned in this post...after writing this, I am running to the buttons and "letting them out of jail"....mine are stored in jars with lids, bags, and tins....I knew no different. At least the metals are in their own jar, since most of my buttons are sorted by colour.THANKS!

[svengali]

The mounting boards you see displayed for sale on eBay are generally ones that the original owner of the buttons made up themselves. I go to stores like Aaron Bros. Art Mart and browse through their bins of matboard, a type of board used for framing artwork. The type with a white core is acid free and the best choice for mountng buttons. I then have each huge sheet cut into 9"x12" sheets, the standard accepted size by the National Button Society and that which will fit into the wooden glass front frames. You can buy pre-made mounting boards at button shows and some internet websites as well. Most of us use a type of coated copper wire to affix the buttons to the board after holes to accommodate the shank are punched. I'm not sure where people get this wire anymore but some years ago I was able to obtain some from phone repair men or cable t.v. technicians. Wires such as this are also sold at button shows and on certain websites. "Lilac" good idea to separate buttons by materials and get them out of jars. Glad you were able to find some useful information on this board.

[buttonsoldbuttons]

Of course I believe you when you tell me something, I also mentioned that I didn't like putting them in water either that is why I tried the dry soda method and I am going to stick to my opinion that it is working since My buttons are not so far showing any further damage. If they do continue to deteriorate I will certainly back off but so far they haven't. I have also been trying to keep them in not so airtight containers. I have always separated them out but I kept the plastic buttons in plastic containers and they came out damaged. I have noticed the smell before. I figured it was related somehow to the deterioration of the buttons. Now you are saying that if there is a small burn hole on the back of a button it has already been tested and we know it is Celluloid. I understood this same test was used to tell the difference between Bakelite and other plastics so it seems to me that if you see a burn mark it could be just about any other type of button than bakelite. Please clarify this point for me. Also on the line of damaged buttons I am seeing some buttons that I know are veg. ivory but they are crazed. any idea what causes this? Thanks for your responses and all the good information you put out it is very helpful to me. Julie

[antlercarv]

On the topic of vegetable ivory: Before I began carving decorative buttons, I once carved a pendant out of tagua nut. It was a delicate little carving, of a lady jumping, with her legs bent up, and her arms bent down to connect to her feet. The pendant was carved right around the "Void" which sometimes occurs in this nut. After about 3 months of constant wear against my skin, and repeated washing in the shower, (I weare a new material hard to test it) the carving began to craze, eventually failing completely. By the same token, I own a wool coat that has dyed tagua buttons. They are lathe-turned commercially made buttons, and have held up to countless rainstorms and much U.V. for at least 7-8 years, without the slightest signs of wear or crazing. It may be the dye, or the polish, or the lack of body oils and acids. I just don't know.

[the-responder]

Reference to vegetable ivory. In reading some of the books in our libraries at Colorado State Button Society, I noticed that the nuts were dried for years and become quite hard. This might be the problem. Was your craving done on a not so dried nut? Thanks - Linda at The Responder

[svengali]

Julie: The previous two replies should give you the answer about vegetable ivory cracking. I feel it's time and laundering that has caused some of the cracking. There's no cure for it that I know of. It's cool you found some method to stop the deterioration of celluloid, bravo. I mispoke when I said if you see test hole on the back it must be celluloid. Actually there are other plastics that will also show a test hole including casein, which is very similar looking to bakelite. The huge difference between bakelite and casein is the chemical makeup of the plastic and how it tests. You can touch a red hot needle to bakelite and hardly see any mark, but casein will melt with a little pressure and leave a brown edge around the test hole. Celluloid test marks won't have the brown edges around the hole. Today those testing with heat are trying not to leave such obvious marks by using a hot tool testing method instead of red hot sewing needles. I personally don't mind seeing the test results because it often means I won't have to test it myself. -Carol-