In the recent years, electronic documentation has gained popularity. Even so, businesses and institutions still depend heavily on paper documents. To lose confidential files like medical or legal documents and even book collections could have serious consequences. Damaged paper quickly deteriorates; therefore a timely and proper document drying procedure is required to cease the damage. Document freeze drying will stabilize the items and restore them to a high and reusable standard. If you have documents damaged by water, freezing documents within 48 hours of the incident can drastically lessen the time and costs of restoration and avoid the need for mold remediation, page separation (if stuck to other pages of paper or items) and other corrective procedures.
Of course document freeze drying service should be done by a reliable professional staff that underwent extensive training. Available techniques such as freeze drying, blast freezing, microbial disinfecting, and deodorization can swiftly restore damaged documents.
Document freeze drying method can help restore documents and can certainly save them. In this process, moisture is sucked out from the documents by freezing it to -40 Celsius and then slowly and gradually warming them back up to room temperature once the moisture is gone. Unfortunately, if the ink is smeared and unreadable, damage from getting wet, it cannot be fixed.
Document freeze drying professionals can encase your dried documents in plastic for further protection and they can also photocopy wet documents to save as much of the information possible. Document freezing followed by vacuum freeze drying is one of the most effective methods available to the restoration specialist for the recovery of water damaged documents.
Freezing is the first line of defense to stop further damage to water absorbing documents. Document freezing also buys the restoration professionals an unlimited amount of time to determine with the insurance company and owner the next course of action needed to restore the content.
While document freeze drying can pretty much salvage the documents brought on by water, customers still get disappointed when they see that it does not look like what it used to before the damage. However, they are not miracle workers so expect slight signs of damage. It is not to say that wet documents cannot be restored. It just involves a different process from document freeze drying.
The rule of thumb is to bring wet documents within 48 hrs. to a document drying specialist. In addition to documents, books, audio tapes, x-ray film and lots of other things can be freeze dried. If your documents are stuck on a clear file or leather case, it can be freeze dried as well.
Keep in mind that there are many different document drying companies available that specialize in document freeze drying and you will need to pick one that will work for your situation. Consider the element that damaged your document, such as water and hire a document freeze drying company that specializes on that. Call the ones you are considering to and find out what their process involves. You need to be assured of no vacuum leaks, otherwise, you will pay a lot for a process that is not done correctly.