[Nhcoll-l] Compactors in collections

[John E Simmons]

A minor correction to Andy's description (he was not yet at KU when the
compactors were installed, so he would not know this)--the original design
was for wire shelving to allow penetration of the sprinkler system
throughout the stack of shelving, but the spacing of the bars was too wide
for our smallest jars (8 oz), so we had galvanized mats cut to fit each
shelf, each mat drilled out to 50% perforation. As Andy said, a blue line
was painted around the walls to show the space needed for sprinkler
clearance (18 inches below the sprinkler heads).

The jars move very slightly on the mats, and as Andy pointed out, there is
a lip on each shelf (which was made by simply turning the shelf upside
down) and earthquake bars. When designing the system, Kate Shaw (the former
fish collection manager) and I worked closely with an architect, who spent
enough time with us to understand what we did in terms of moving jars in
and out of the collection. The architect came up with several important
criteria for the system, including using stainless steel shelving and the
mats rather than powder-coated shelves (which can be scratched), and making
sure that it took 8 turns to move the compactor one full carriage width to
ensure that the movement was slow and easy. On the architect's advice, the
contract required that a test carriage and shelves be installed on tracks
in the facility and the collection managers group got to abuse it all we
could to see how it would work (we rocked it back and forth fully loaded,
crashed it into the wall, and placed alcohol and formaldehyde soaked rags
on the shelves to check for evidence of oxidation). As Andy said, the
system has worked very well except of the oxidation of some metal parts
caused by the ridiculous requirement to maintain 100% air makeup in the
building (which is overkill).

You do have to keep a close eye on the terms of the contract. The local rep
for the compactor company was wonderful to work with, but due to the size
of our contract, the company sent down two reps from the main office, who
were absolute jerks, and at the last minute tried to do a bait-and-switch
for cheaper shelving on us. We caught them out on it, and with the
architect's support, kept the original contract terms intact. As with any
project, write the contract very carefully, get an outsider to look it
over, and then watch every step of the installation like a hawk. The
company got really tired of Kate and I inspecting their work all day every
day, but it paid off--we made sure they did it right.

If you use large wheels and the right gearing on the carriages, the
movement of objects when compactor carriages are moved should not be any
worse than moving drawers or trays in and out of a cabinet. The solution to
the movement is not fixed shelving, but rather adequate supports for the
objects. In 50+ years of inspecting collections, I have seen far more
damage to specimens from the vibrations of drawers and trays than from the
vibrations of properly designed compactors.

The compactors at KU were installed in spring 1996, so they are now almost
26 years old.

--John

Museologica
*and*
Associate Curator of Collections
Earth and Mineral Science Museum & Art Gallery
Penn State University
*and*
Investigador Asociado, Departamento de Ornitologia
Museo de Historia Natural, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima


On Wed, Dec 15, 2021 at 9:47 AM Bentley, Andrew Charles <abentley at ku.edu>
wrote:

> We had our compactors for our wet collections specifically designed with
> that in mind – no upper “lid” on each compactor aisle and each shelf had to
> be perforated in order to allow water from sprinkler system to filter
> through.  We initially had metal liners on each shelf that were solid and
> they all had to be sent back to be perforated with hundreds of tiny holes.
> Our fire marshal also imposed an upper limit as to how high things could be
> stored so as to allow space between the last upper shelf and the sprinkler
> heads for better coverage.
>
>
>
> We also have “earthquake” bars on the front of each shelf – not only in
> the event of seismic activity but also to ward against anything toppling
> off a shelf while moving.  On the whole we have been happy with our
> compactor system in our wet collection.  Even though it is now about 20
> years old it still functions just fine.  The only issue we have had is
> rusting of the internal mechanism due to high humidity events in our wet
> wing caused by a less than perfect HVAC system.  This has affected locking
> mechanisms, chains, etc. and rails.
>
>
>
> Andy
>
>     A  :             A  :             A  :
>  }<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<)))_°>
>     V                V                V
> Andy Bentley
> Ichthyology Collection Manager
> University of Kansas
> Biodiversity Institute
>
> Dyche Hall
> 1345 Jayhawk Boulevard
> Lawrence, KS, 66045-7561
> USA
>
> Tel: (785) 864-3863
> Fax: (785) 864-5335
> Email: abentley at ku.edu
>
> ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3093-1258
>
> http://ichthyology.biodiversity.ku.edu
>
>     A  :             A  :             A  :
>  }<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<)))_°>
>     V                V                V
>
>
>
> *From:* Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> * On Behalf Of *
> Callomon,Paul
> *Sent:* Wednesday, December 15, 2021 8:35 AM
> *To:* rapp at inpa.gov.br; Douglas Yanega <dyanega at gmail.com>;
> nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu
> *Subject:* Re: [Nhcoll-l] Compactors in collections
>
>
>
> Lucia’s comments reminded me of another major caveat about compactors: if
> you’re planning on using them for wet collections, at least in the USA,
> check with your fire marshal and insurers first. As she pointed out, in a
> serious fire a compacted wet collection without sufficient venting is an
> enormous fuel-air bomb. Ethanol burns fairly quickly anyway, but if it’s
> pre-heated before encountering a flame, weakening or even popping the lids
> and filling the compactor with vapor, then an explosion becomes more likely
> and the whole building could go.
>
>
>
>
>
> Paul Callomon
>
> Collection Manager, Malacology and General Invertebrates
> ------------------------------
>
> *Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University*
>
> 1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia PA 19103-1195, USA
> *prc44 at drexel.edu <prc44 at drexel.edu> Tel 215-405-5096 - Fax 215-299-1170*
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> *On Behalf Of *
> rapp at inpa.gov.br
> *Sent:* Wednesday, December 15, 2021 9:23 AM
> *To:* Douglas Yanega <dyanega at gmail.com>; nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu
> *Subject:* Re: [Nhcoll-l] Compactors in collections
>
>
>
> *External.*
>
> I can't resist to add my comments after Douglas.
>
> Yes, you have "literally to breathe down the necks of the people from the
> compactor company "! This expression is great and it was exactly my
> experience. Although I received the visitation of an engineer in
> compactors, the project assembled by them made me order for half extra
> budget of complements! The shelves came with an internal "channel" designed
> to keep the rigidity of the shelf, however, for alcohol collections the
> jars could turn!!! So, I had to order extra covers for these channels. I
> also had to order extra steel bars for protection to avoid the jars to fall
> from the shelves. The initial project reduced the number of shelves from 6
> to 5 despite of all my observations. I had to order extra shelves and
> connections. Maybe it was just local incompetence, but compactor companies
> may be not familiar with our kind of storaged material.
>
> I ended up gaining approx. 40% of space, what was great. I also order for
> holes, small openings, on the top shelves, to avoid excessive heat during
> fires. One of our Brazilian collections (Butantan) lost all the material
> inside compactors during a fire because the material "cooked" inside and
> the cabinets would not role with the heat. I hope I will never have to test
> if this idea will work or not...
>
> cheers
>
> Lucia Rapp Py-Daniel
> Fish Colelction - INPA
> Manaus, AM, Brazil
>
>
>
>
>
> 14 de dezembro de 2021 14:14, "Douglas Yanega" <dyanega at gmail.com
> <dyanega at gmail.com?to=%22Douglas%20Yanega%22%20%3cdyanega at gmail.com%3e>>
> escreveu:
>
> On 12/14/21 7:58 AM, Ann Bogaerts wrote:
>
> Hello everybody,
>
> We wish to renovate our herbarium with 4 milj. specimens and we want to
> get some feedback from other institutions who already renovated or renewed
> their collection buildings.
>
> One of our main questions is the use of compactors yes or no? So what is
> your opinion about this? How much space do you save using a compactor and
> how is it working with this kind of system? For which collections do you
> use it?
>
> We are really interested in the do's and don'ts and it would also be nice
> if you could send us a picture of the compactors you use.
>
> Briefly: our insect collection went from regular static insect cabinets to
> a compactor system in 2002. It almost doubled our storage capacity (instead
> of 7 aisles and 8 rows of cabinets, we now have 2 aisles and 13 rows of
> cabinets). That bought us a few decades' worth of expansion.
>
> Liquid storage cabinets are in the static units to either side, and and
> microscope slides are in a narrow shelving unit in the middle; the 11
> movable compactor units are only for cabinets of pinned specimens, and
> operated manually. In 18 years we have not needed any repairs, which is a
> far better track record than electric-powered compactor systems. Insects on
> pins are fragile but not as bad as people might think; we routinely ship
> specimens using postal delivery and only rarely experience significant
> damage.
>
> The MAJOR caveat for compactors has to do with design and execution: we
> had to literally breathe down the necks of the people from the compactor
> company because they kept screwing up the blueprints and specs for the
> hardware dimensions in very minor ways, and there were also issues with
> pouring a layer of concrete on top of an existing floor. To illustrate how
> subtle but devastating a mistake can be, one of the things they didn't
> account for was that both sides of each moving unit had a knob that could
> be pulled out to engage the brake on that side. Those knobs stuck out an
> inch when fully retracted. We have two aisles, and each was calculated on
> the blueprints to be about 36 inches wide, and there are 6 moving compactor
> units on one side and 5 on the other. They failed to realize that their
> calculations had *excluded the knobs*, which subtracted 2 inches of space
> per unit. Had they proceeded with the installation as planned, the aisle on
> one side would have been only 24 inches, and only 26 inches on the other,
> which isn't even enough space to open the cabinet doors. I caught this
> mistake and had them machine the knobs an inch shorter so they retract
> almost flush with the side, instead of projecting; they are a little tricky
> to pull out, but at least we can work in the aisles. They similarly failed
> to account for the three inches in height that were added by the wheels of
> the undercarriage on the compactor units, but I didn't catch that mistake,
> so the tops of some cabinets would have run into some low-hanging ceiling
> ductwork that we had expected to be clear. We had to rebuild the ductwork
> before all the cabinets could be installed.
>
> I advise anyone planning compactors to stay very actively engaged during
> the design process, and don't trust the contractors to get every little
> detail right. Be very wary in particular about the precision of dimensions,
> and maybe plan a few extra inches here and there if you can.
>
> Peace,
>
> -- Doug Yanega Dept. of Entomology Entomology Research Museum Univ. of California, Riverside, CA 92521-0314 skype: dyanega phone: (951) 827-4315 (disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's) https://faculty.ucr.edu/~heraty/yanega.html <https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffaculty.ucr.edu%2F~heraty%2Fyanega.html&data=04%7C01%7Cabentley%40ku.edu%7C6a62565369f44ca59f6008d9bfd822c8%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C637751757290536243%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000&sdata=WWw%2B0YLo8c23P2240anN%2BUqyF6ZEjCTYpXb%2FfqCnHko%3D&reserved=0> "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82
>
>
>
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