White spor removal from VHS

Just recently a charity shop I frequent shut down because of a lack of income. The lady who ran it gave gave me a phone call and told me a lot of VHS and electrical stuff was going to hit the trash and that she'd sell me the lot for very cheap. I went into the backroom and bought almost 200vhs a few tvs and some stereos. The TV's and stereos work just fine however due to the damp conditions of the backroom they had been sitting on the VHS tapes have white spors on the tape itsself. How can i remove this? None of the VHS are rare but it would be a shame to see them rot.

 

Putting my museum hat on, that sounds like tape mold which does eat the cellouse of the tape making the tape basically unplayable. If it isn't nothing rare or is on DVD then dispose of it, as you will spend far too long trying to remove it. I wouldn't use assemblers suggestion as you could then infect tapes that don't have tape mold and you would just be spreading it and it wouldn't remove the mold well well.

Don't put a tape in the tape player as you will spread the spores in the player which will infect tapes you then play on it.

I know that the museum I am working in, tends to sterilise the tapes (all types including Reel to reel, VHS, Umatic, Compact Cassette, etc) using a oxygen vacuum, which chances are you don't have access too. Before opening them and slowly removing the dead spores using a weak alcohol solution and a pellon (TM) cloth. Oh and they do this wearing latex gloves, a HEPA mask, a lab coat and plastic bags over the shoes and they wash the lab coats and clothes they use straight after to stop any possible spore spreading.

after this the tape is digitised so that the original can be disposed of or vacuum stored.

Remember the spores should not be breathed in as they can cause problems, wash hands if you hand the tapes and wash clothes as well.

 

Absolutely - if it's nothing vital (and let's face it, charity shops mostly have pre-recorded stuff that's often now available on DVD), bin it. It really isn't worth the hassle and possible implications to your health, your machine and any other tapes you run in it afterwards.

You really do need a specialist setup for cleaning tapes. Another method that is sometimes necessitated involves a custom-made spooler with a diamond-tip blade. It's quite a risky process!

 

Sounds like the tapes need binning then. Shame as I hate to really bin anything without trying. Ill put the covers in my paper bin and give the tape boxes a thorough washing and they can probably be reused.

 

i would suggest that if you want to clean the covers that you wear latex gloves and a hepa mask, do it outdoors or in a well ventelated area. Remove the paper covers outside and put them straight into a plastic bag and make sure you tie the bag up or if you are having a bonfire then you can happily burn them.

For the boxes, use a bleach solution (I would try to aim for 1 part bleach to 4 parts water, you could use alcohol too but you would want a higher ratio and it would be more expensive) as you want to kill all the spores, boiling water would warp the tape covers and may not kill all the spores and you risk disturbing the spores and spreading them. I would leave it for at least a few hours. Use paper towels and gloves to rub off any big spore clumps in the bleach solution, use latex gloves, be careful and wash your hands and arms with lots of soap and water afterwards.

If you have to go back indoors then try to remove your outer clothing and wash it straight away use a cycle that will do a prewash before the main wash and use as high a temp as possible.

When rinsing them, rinse it using new latex gloves under cold water making sure to remove all the white spores, use paper towels to rub them off if need be, dry them with paper towels and put to one side. The idea is to make sure that there are no spores remaining, use a small flatblade screwdriver to remove spores from places you may not be able to reach.

Put them in a large clean cardboard box, cover the box in a large bin liner and put somewhere dry and at room temp for a month, the idea is to make sure you have killed all the spores and if you have then they will still probably smell of bleach and be all clean and plastic like if you do see spores then repeat.

A lot of conservationists do not like this method mainly as it runs the risk of removing the oxide from the tape, and if it is old or been in damp conditions this is more likely to occur.

It is quicker once the tape has been sterlised but you would only use it on newer tapes that are known to use high quality tape otherwise it's open the tape up and remove the dead spores manually.

 

I have an old bath in the back garden. I was figuring on putting cold water and bleach in there. I wont get as many tape boxes in but it will get the job done. I have bagged up the covers and will probably ring the recycling factory near me soon and explain the situation. If they say they dont want potentially infected paper I'll just burn it.

 

I think bleach might be a bad idea. Isoproply alcohol is the main ingredient in tape head cleaners. Maybe that would be a safer option.

 

To clean the video cases, highly diluted bleach will be fine as the idea is to kill the spores, feel free to test one to ber sure.

Pure alcohol would be a better choice but it tends to be a lot more expensive and probably more then what the cases are worth to use enough to clean them.

 

The bleach removed the spores just fine. Got maybe 50 or so done today.