Hello

So, I have a suit of armor with leather straps and buckles. I won't get too much in details, but I had an issue with the straps being too longs and "flapping around". A friend of mine suggested adding little rubber elastics to help keep them down - not really historical, but they were small, didn't show, cheap and worked. So I left them there as part of my armor, and wore it several times over the course of a few months.

Fast forward about a year... I get out my suit, which I haven't worn in a while, and lo and behold, the elastics were all brittle and falling apart! The suit was out of the sun, and the rubber elastic were not touching metal, only cloth and leather. Spare elastics that were just "sitting there" on a shelf were still in good shape.

Based on this, I think I can conclude that long term latex on leather contact is probably a bad idea.

cheers,

Observer