Abstract
Wear and tear is the outcome of degradation most frequently reported in assessments of archival and library collections. It is also problematic to study in controlled experiments, due to the difficulty in reproducing the conditions in which original objects are kept and used in archives and libraries. Hence, data collected from actual collections, for instance during surveys, could provide the evidence on how wear and tear occurs. However, to be useful, such data need to be purposely collected and analysed: unlike the usual collection surveys, the aim is not to quantify the prevalence of a certain damage type but to provide evidence on how such damage occurs. In this paper we explore whether two approaches used in other disciplines could be useful: reliability engineering, the method that deals with failure in complex systems, and epidemiology, which explores diseases in defined populations. We show that based on reliability engineering we can decide which data related to the causes of mechanical failure should be collected during collection surveys, while using epidemiology we can develop the study design and the data analysis needed to study the relationship between mechanical failure, and the factors that might affect the degree of failure. The results of epidemiological studies in heritage collections could provide quantitative evidence of patterns of decay in collections, and corroborate the qualitative analysis provided by reliability. The results can directly support collection management decisions or can be used in mathematical models in which the effect of preservation measures is explored.
Highlights
During condition assessments in archives and libraries, mechanical degradation, understood as wear and tear, has repeatedly been identified as one of the most frequent types of damage [1, 2], associated with one of the highest risks for physical collections [3]
In the first part of this paper we explore the applicability of reliability concepts, such as failure rate and classification of failure causes, to evaluate the relevance of the information collected in surveys, and whether other factors should be included when studying the occurrence and accumulation of mechanical failure in the complex setting of the collections
Survival analysis So far we introduced qualitative analysis provided by reliability to study mechanical degradation in collections
Summary
During condition assessments in archives and libraries, mechanical degradation, understood as wear and tear, has repeatedly been identified as one of the most frequent types of damage [1, 2], associated with one of the highest risks for physical collections [3]. Introduction During condition assessments in archives and libraries, mechanical degradation, understood as wear and tear, has repeatedly been identified as one of the most frequent types of damage [1, 2], associated with one of the highest risks for physical collections [3].
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