Dear members of SIGCIS, we plan to hand in a research project about the plastics used in electronic artefacts in information and telecommunication technologies. Two topics are being researched: a) based on selected artefacts from two museums in Munich (milestones of the technological development) we aim to characterise the plastics used in the production of personal computers and of radios. We intend to understand the reasons why plastics were selected for production or for changes in their choice. The plastic selection can be based on some or more of the following reasons: design, function, costs of production, properties of the plastic in question (weight, workability, colour, resistance to shok, resistance to heat, ...), historical reasons as availability or non availabilty of raw materials during war or post war periods, etc. - What were the advantages and disadvantages of past used plastics in the production of electronic artefacts? - Why were some plastics preferred in a certain period and substituted later on? - Which development similarities do we find between the production of personal computers and radios? - What were the main reasons for the selection of plastics in which period of the twentieth century? For the investigation of personal computers we are identifying the plastics by means of infrared spectroscopy of the following elements: - housing - power cables - operating elements (push buttons) - printed circuit board (e.g. mother board) - integrated circuits Below your find the a pre-selection of personal computers dating from 1975 to 2000: Personal Computer Production date Heimcomputer "MITS Altair 8800" 1975 Personal Computer Apple II IA2S2 ca. 1980 Personal Computer Osborne 1 1983 Personal Computer Apple Macintosh 512K ca. 1985 Personal Computer Macintosh Plus 1 Mb Personal Computer, sign.: Commodore 64 1992 Notebook Apple iBook SE 466 2000 b) based on a condition survey of personal computers and radios from two museums in Munich (several hundreds of objects in storage) we aim to identify the main decay patterns of plastic materials (yellowing, discoloration, desintegration, loss of plasticizer). After identifying the main weathering decay forms, we will analyse the plastics, so that we can correlate material and decay. For instance, until now we have noticed that ABS is prone to yellowing, plasticized PVC is prone to loss of plasticizer and tha rubber is prone to desintegration. By identifying the amount of objects at risk in the collection we can establish priorities for the active or passive conservation. We would like to ask you whether you find this topic interesting and kindly ask you to discuss with us our aims and methodology. Best wishes Dr. Marisa Pamplona-Bartsch (& Ulf Hashagen, who forwarded this Email of his colleague Marisa to sigcis) -- Objekt- und Restaurierungsforschungsabteilung Conservation Science Department Deutsches Museum Museumsinsel 1, 80538 München, Germany tel + 49 (0)89 / 21 79 512 e-mail:m.pamplona@deutsches-museum.de