Digital BW, The Print

Diana,

Thank you for the very informative post on paper technology! Much 
appreciated.

Perhaps you can answer another question for me.

It is my understanding that you can manufacture an acid free paper 
without buffering that is archival. It just doesn't have an alkaline 
reserve to protect it from environmental pollutants. Such papers have 
a pH close to 7 after manufacturing. However, after a short period of 
time the pH falls to about 6.0 and stabilizes at this point. The 
problem being that the pH pens then show these papers as acid 
containing and are incorrectly identified as being non-archival.

Did I get this straight or am I off track?

Thanks,
Martin

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "Diana York / Hawk Meadow 
Morgans" <diana@h...> wrote:
> Cotton paper is 100% alphacellulose. But 100% alphacellulose paper 
does not
> necessary mean 100% cotton.
> 
> Cotton fiber is naturally very high in alphacellulose (~95-98%) so 
it takes
> very little refining to obtain 100% alphacellulose pulp.
> 
> Wood is usually less than 50% alphacellulose (it also contains 
lignin and
> hemicellulose). So wood pulp must be refined and purified much more 
than
> cotton in order to obtain a 100% alphacellulose pulp.
> The sulfite process is one way of purifying wood pulp (involves use 
of
> acid).
> SO
> according to the description of Legion Photo Matte, it is 100%
> alphacellulose paper, derived from wood fiber, purified by sulfite 
process,
> and buffered to neutral pH.
> 
> Hope this helps.
> 
> 
(snip)