Boil Tested Buttons

Are modern buttons boil tested in the year 2019? It seems overkill to me, even back then. If you had the plastics formulation down pat, and tested it once, would you have to boil every button that came off the "assembly" line?

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Posted By: Paul - Thu Jun 06, 2019
Category: Destruction | Domestic | Fashion | Advertising | Twentieth Century

Comments

If you're wondering about the term coppers in the ad, here's an explanation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wash_copper

Posted by ges on 06/06/19 at 08:33 AM

The most popular casein-based plastics are notorious for warping. It happens most often with thick cross-sections, but I wouldn't be surprised if the differences across a button (thick rim, thin center) contributed to problems. With inconsistent purity of materials, still fairly primitive batch mixing and extruding, and no way to detect stresses in sheets prior to cutting, it isn't beyond the bounds of reason that someone thought boiling the buttons was a good way to sort out those which would curl. The fact that many people of the time still boiled their clothes, it played to good marketing.

Posted by Phideaux on 06/06/19 at 09:20 AM

The company that made these buttons got its start in something I never heard of -- sheep branding oil.
http://www.ausbuttonhistory.com/?page_id=251

Posted by ges on 06/06/19 at 04:03 PM

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