Rusty needles & sytrofoam relaxing chamber

[nomihoudai]

After my topic with the dermestidae in the beginning of winter I am running now in the next collector's nightmare.

I have a new type of relaxing chamber and in that relaxing chamber I have my regular butterfly needles (black, size 1) pinned in styrofoam and the whole swimming in water. Now after 1 month the needles started to rust at their base where they were in contact with water and styrofoam.

Now my questions are:

- Is 1 month in water and styrofoam before rusting a good time and they are safe to use?
- Or shouldn't that have happened and I can be sure that my collection will rust away in 50 years time?
- Had the black color something to do with it ?
- Do you have a brand of needles that you tested for a month or more in water that never rusted and you can recommend?

I have sorted old collections in museums and I know how sad rusty needles are. Once I had a wonderful collection before me but the guy used cheap German after-war needles. Many of the needles where impossible to get out of the drawer, they simply broke in the middle due to rust.

Rgds Claude

[bobw]

Black enamel-coated pins are notorious for oxidisation. Stainless steel pins are much better.

Bob

[prillbug2]

I don't relax my specimens that way. I use a tupper ware, and layer the specimens in the envelopes between sheets of cotton, or paper towels. Each layer dampened, and I put a couple drops of ammonia in to keep mold erupting. For me it only takes about 24 hours to relax a specimen. I don't inject, because most of my insects are too small for injection. Usually, I seal it with electric tape and then check it after 24 hours. Mounted specimens, I just place them into the relaxing chamber after dampening the cotton or paper towels, and they are usually relaxed in a few hours. Your way is very poorly conceived.
Jeff Prill

[nomihoudai]

Jeff you misunderstood my post. I explained the thing with the relaxing chamber only to explain how and when my needles turned rusty.

Here is a picture for better explanation, the needles keeping the specimen safe in the styrofoam turned rusty. Should I now switch to natural stainless steel needles? I actually liked the black coated ones much better

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[Chris Grinter]

Yes, stainless steel is the only solution. What you're seeing with the enamel in your relaxing box is what happens to the pin in slow motion over years in an insect - collections that are 100+ years old are riddled with rotting pins. Enamel is the enemy! haha

[wolf]

Thankfully not in teeth! ;D

[rayrard]

Feb 16, 2012 9:42:53 GMT -8 Chris Grinter said:

Yes, stainless steel is the only solution. What you're seeing with the enamel in your relaxing box is what happens to the pin in slow motion over years in an insect - collections that are 100+ years old are riddled with rotting pins. Enamel is the enemy! haha

I use the black pins more because the specimens tend to spin on the stainless steel ones much easier. I just takes a gentle nudge on them to get them spinning on their pins. The black ones seem to "stick" better.

[prillbug2]

I did not misunderstand you. I would not do it that way.
Jeff Prill

[nomihoudai]

Seems like I will have to switch then to stainless steal pins. I actually saw now that the black pins have been produced with spring steel and that the black enamel should save them from rusting what it did not. I really do prefer the look of the black pins but keeping my collection safe for a time that will exceed my lifetime by far is more important to me. Good point is that I still have not bought new pins for this season so the next delivery will be stainless steel with no black color.

@ Ray, spinning specimen do not bother me too much, I also mount micro moths and always have double pinning strips laying around. If a specimen spins on the needle I usually add such a strip under the body to prevent it from spinning.

@ Jeff, I used the method you described before but was not satisfied with it. The method I have now is a mix between methods posted by Chris Grinter, veedubman and our local professional lepidopterologist. Specimen do relax within 6h - 48h, I had no grease problems and no mold problems. Also I ended up with lots of wasted papertowels or other towels when using a relaxing method with moist towels, this method here does not produce any waste except for maybe a small piece of styrofoam once a year.

[Deleted]

Claude,

Forgive if I'm missing something, but I checked over your pic and really saw no reason to put metal pins of any kind in that softener. I am posting a pic where one uses tupperware, sponges, and screened zig-zag rackes to hold the specimens where the wings don't get in contact with towels. I use PCB crystals to retard mold. When I put this on my 25w tubular bulb rack, most all can be totally soft in several hours. Stryofoam does not hold water, but actually repels it....almost separating the leps from the humidity a bit as they are kind of on a dryish surface. Sponges let the water/humidity flow throughout the chamber.

Just my thoughts. I am not professing to know it all, but thought it warranted a response.

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[ckswank]

Hi, Bill. I really like the idea of these zig-zag racks. Going to try it soon. Thanks for posting.

Charlie

[nomihoudai]

@bill

There is two layers of 1cm styrofoam. The needles hold the upper level together to the bottom level. I first put a large piece of styrofoam which nearly covers most of the box. I put a lot of holes into that one with a #1 pin. These holes do suck up water trough capillarity effect. Then due to the large surface of the styrofoam (it is a lot of small balls glued more or less together) it is perfect for distributing and evaporation of the water. I can not share the comment that styrofoam is water resistant in this setup, the bottom level is always very moist and puts a high humidity troughout the second level. The second level on the other hand is not moist and damage due to water perls building up between specimen and floor have not been whitnessed so far.

I also tried your setup but it didn't work out either for me. I am mainly relaxing and collecting blue Lycaenidae at the moment. I don't know if you collect many of these but they are a pain in the ### due to grease and water damage. If the blue wing of a butterfly of Polyommatus group gets hit by water the color changes to a dull green one. Also hot water is bad for them as they store lots of fat in their bodies and this leaks out when using hot water also changing to green dots.

The topic initially was meant for my rusty pin problem which would have wasted my collection but as we are now discussing the relaxing box I changed the title. There is as many relaxing techniques as collectors and it is not strange to see hat many people have different methods.

[nomihoudai]

Here what I am talking about, Polyommatus (Lysandra) bellargus. Left specimen relaxed in my new box with no fear of water or heat damage. Right two specimen were my first P. bellargus ever and I totally screwed them up when relaxing. I used water soaked paper sheets with hot water back then.

It really is 3 times the same species and the two right specimen had been as blue as the left one when I caught them!

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[Deleted]

@claude,

Thanks for answering/explaining more to me. Hope your pin issue does get worked out to your satisfaction. Did not know you put additional holes into your styrofoam. I do a fair number of small stuff, but don't focus on it.

Cswank.....you're welcome. Someone gave me that idea years ago.....I plumb honest forgot who it was.

[prillbug2]

Hey, I just relaxed 30 more of my moths, no water damage, no heat damage, no mold. They were relaxed in 8 hours, I spread them after twelve hours. My method works because I have it down to the point where I don't have to mess with it anymore. I haven't had mold in my relaxing chambers for months. By the way, these moths were from Lake Baical in Russia. No color loss. Everything was in the original envelopes, I only removed them to check them for proper flexibility. By the way they were so perfectly relaxed that I could pull the genitalia of most of the males. So, if my method doesn't work, this is proof that you are all wrong!
Jeff Prill