Museums and exhibition halls use fabrics to preserve their artworks or as a support on which to display the various valuable objects they wish to show the public.
To ensure proper conservation of these precious objects, it must be ensured that the fabrics on which they are placed do not react with the materials of which these objects are composed.
The Oddy Test is a procedure created at the British Museum in London by conservation scientist William Andrew Oddy in 1973, and later improved by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, to test materials in and around artworks.
At ORDUÑA 1755 SL, we have developed two fabrics that have passed the Oddy Test: a standard 100% cotton fabric (Piqué Ducal 290 g/m2 natural white) and a 100% polyester flame-retardant fabric (Loneta Duero 200 g/m2 natural white).
This test is performed because, although fabrics may be safe for their intended purposes, they can emit small amounts of chemical gases that may, over time, damage valuable objects with which they come into contact. Therefore, to guarantee their perfect conservation, it is mandatory to test and evaluate these fabrics.
The principle on which the Oddy Test is based is the corrosion of metals in the presence of high temperature and relative humidity, and oxidizing gases originating from the materials being tested.
The test consists of placing the material to be tested and three metal coupon samples (copper, silver, and lead) together in a hermetically sealed container for 28 days at 100% relative humidity and a temperature of 60ºC. After this period, the metals are analyzed, and conclusions are drawn based on the corrosion elements that have appeared.
The test is performed with the three metals mentioned above (silver, chromium, and lead), but any other metal sensitive to contamination, such as aluminum or zinc, can also be added.