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Dana - My rule of thumb (and Tom Strang and Mary-Lou Florian) is 72 hours. For wood-destroyers, I recommend a first shot for 72 hours, let the materials then warm to room temperature, and then a second shot for 48 hours. Since archives are so dense, this may be the scenario you need, although I doubt it. You have to consider what might be infesting archival materials. Booklice, silverfish, yes even bed bugs? They are easy to kill with a 72 hour scenario. If it's "book worms" (Anobiids), then the two stage effort will probably be required. Tom -----Original Message----- From: dana senge <dkse...@gmail.com> To: pestlist <pestlist@museumpests.net> Sent: Sun, Mar 11, 2012 12:27 am Subject: Re: [pestlist] Freezer Trucks This is a message from the Museumpests List. o post to this list send it as an email to pestlist@museumpests.net o unsubscribe please look at the footer of this email. ---------------------------------------------------------- hanks Tom, While the truck temperature reached 32 degrees F in 4 hours, the emperature inside the box of records definitely did not. The issue ou raise- is one of my largest concerns- it took over 24 hours for he internal temperature of the record box to reach 32 degrees- is his so long that the insects can switch to hibernation mode and avoid reezing or is 24 hours still quick enough to catch the insects off uard and kill them? To my knowledge we haven't found any insects (alive or dead) in these oxes. We are looking at this data in part to make sure that we are aking accurate recommendations for further use. And for other ollection materials that may host tougher insects. I am glad to hear you have had success with freezer trucks- do you ecommend variations in the length of time in the freezer truck- over he standard 48 hours currently recommended for chest freezers? Dana On Sat, Mar 10, 2012 at 6:58 PM, <bugma...@aol.com> wrote: This is a message from the Museumpests List. To post to this list send it as an email to pestlist@museumpests.net To unsubscribe please look at the footer of this email. ----------------------------------------------------------- Dana - First of all, the temperature does not have to reach -20F in 4 hours. It should reach 32F in 4 hours. That's sufficient. The reason you use a truck capable of maintaining -20F, is it will reach the desired 32F in 4 hours. Once the liquid in adults, larvae, and eggs reaches a freezing temperature, ice particles form and destroy the cellular structure of the living organisms. Unless you're dealing with "book worms", which I doubt you are with archival records, any insects found in these materials will certainly be killed. When freezing anything, you're trying to beat insects from forming natural defenses to freezing. I think your process worked fine. Have you found any live insects? I have had plenty of sucessful freezing episodes with freezer trucks, containers, and warehouses. Tom Parker -----Original Message----- From: dana senge <dkse...@gmail.com> To: pestlist <pestlist@museumpests.net> Sent: Sat, Mar 10, 2012 8:41 pm Subject: [pestlist] Freezer Trucks This is a message from the Museumpests List. To post to this list send it as an email to pestlist@museumpests.net To unsubscribe please look at the footer of this email. ----------------------------------------------------------- We recently tried using a freezer truck to process a large number of boxes of archives. Record boxes were stacked in rows with 12" gaps between the rows to allow for air circulation. We placed a datalogger in the center of one of the boxes of archive materials (in the center of the truck) and another outside the boxes to measure the temperature of the air in the truck box. The results were surprising. We had been informed that the truck would go down to -20 degrees F in 4 hours. Our data loggers showed that it took 10 hours for the air in the truck to go from 44 degrees F to -15 degrees F, and the temperature inside one of the record boxes took ~96 hours to drop from 70 degrees to -15 degrees. (The boxes had been in a 72 degree environment before being placed in the truck box). It appears that the starting temperature of the boxes of paper was more difficult to reduce than I expected. And the truck never achieved the desired temperature. We are very disappointed in these initial results and are trying to figure out if there is a different strategy for using a freezer truck, or if this is just not feasible for freezing densely packed materials, such as paper packed in a record box. We are discussing packing boxes half full and packing the truck to allow for even more air circulation. But it seems that getting to the goal of -20 degrees F in 4 hours may not be feasible. Does anyone have any positive experiences working with a freezer truck for processing a large quantity of materials? Especially dense materials such as wood or boxes of paper? Thanks, Dana Senge Assistant Conservator National Park Service Intermountain Region Museum Services Program Tucson, AZ 85745 520-791-6432 dana_se...@nps.gov ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To send an email to the list, send your msg to pestlist@museumpests.Net To unsubscribe from this list send an email to pestlist@museumpests.net and in the subject put: "unsubscribe" - no quotes please. You are receiving the Pestlist emails in standard mode. To change to the DIGEST mode send an email to imail...@museumpests.net with this command in the body: set mode digest pestlist Any problems email l...@collectionpests.com or l...@zaks.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To send an email to the list, send your msg to pestlist@museumpests.Net To unsubscribe from this list send an email to pestlist@museumpests.net and in the subject put: "unsubscribe" - no quotes please. 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