Police say a small homemade bomb was found at the Villawood Immigration Detention Centre a month before a riot there resulted in nine buildings being gutted by fire.
Fingerprint and DNA tests are being carried out on oil and aerosol cans found in the computer room in March this year, police say.
Assistant Commissioner Frank Menilli said an aerosol can, a bottle of Johnson's baby oil and a bottle of canola oil were found on a table in the centre.
"The information is that there was a can of canola oil and tropical strength Aeroguard on a table," Mr Menilli told Macquarie radio on Wednesday. It also has been reported that canola oil had been spread over the ground.
The items were discovered on March 19 after police from Bankstown Local Area command went to the centre following a fire in a computer room, a spokesman from NSW Police said on Wednesday.
"Police discovered a homemade device consisting of a number of potentially flammable items," the spokesman told AAP.
"The fire does appear to be deliberately lit."
Jamal Daoud, from the Social Justice Network, said he had spoken to detainees, who dismissed the allegations.
"They all were laughing loudly," he said in a statement on Wednesday. "They told me that at that time, flames came from one of the computers. When the police arrived, they searched the room, then they closed it and left."
Asked whether she had heard reports about the possible homemade bombs on morning radio, Prime Minister Julia Gillard said she would not "speculate" on the matter.
"Of course we have our detention centres overseen by contracted body SERCO and there are a set of contractual obligations that require them to provide appropriate security," she told reporters in Sydney.
"We will take appropriate advice about it. Sometimes things said on radio stations prove on analysis not to be 100 per cent right."
The fire in the computer room was followed by a riot at the detention centre on April 20, which left nine buildings gutted and led to 22 detainees being questioned by police.
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