Changing of comic bags and storage options

[Artboy99]

I keep hearing from comic collectors here on the boards that you should change your comic bags every 3-5 years. Anyone have an opinion on this? I have seen just as many posts that say you dont have to.

I have several 9.2+ Tales to Astonish and other books I would like to keep as preserved as possible but I dont want to CGC/encapsulate them at this time.

Currently I just have them bagged and boarded. I am considering Buying microchamber paper, and going the route of Microchamber paper/ board back/ inside silver age sized mylar upside down/ then inside golden age mylar right side up. This way they would be air sealed and I wouldnt have to worry about them for many years.

Any thoughts?

 

Thanks for any advice

 

Artboy99

[divad]

I keep hearing from comic collectors here on the boards that you should change your comic bags every 3-5 years. Anyone have an opinion on this? I have seen just as many posts that say you dont have to.

 

Artboy - There are so many threads just wade through them. BTW, how many books are we talkin' - it doesn't sound like you have many?

 

I have several 9.2+ Tales to Astonish and other books I would like to keep as preserved as possible but I dont want to CGC/encapsulate them at this time.

Currently I just have them bagged and boarded. I am considering Buying microchamber paper, and going the route of Microchamber paper/ board back/ inside silver age sized mylar upside down/ then inside golden age mylar right side up. This way they would be air sealed and I wouldnt have to worry about them for many years.

Any thoughts?

Thanks for any advice

Artboy99

 

For starters, buy yourself 50 SA size 2-mil mylars or 4-mil mylar sleeves and 50 SA buffered full backs from E.Gerber. I prefer the open-ended 4-mil sleeves for both rigidity and off-gassing. Realistically, given proper storage, you will never have to replace these.

 

Get 'em out of the poly bags pronto - they are really just for temporary storage.

[Artboy99]

Well, My collection isnt huge, but is about 2,000 books containing full runs of Incredible Hulk vol 1, Conan and a good chunk of Spidermans vol 1 ranging from single digit issues to 175 in addition to the afforementioned Tales to Astonish. Many other books and many of special Interest to me ( FF 12, JIM 112, etc..notice a Hulk theme? ).

The bulk of my collection is in poly comic bags ( new as of Dec 2004 ). The lesser demand books like my full run of Defenders and full run Marvel team up runs are in poly bags with 2 issues and a backing board per bag. These are place back to back with board in between. The rest like my daredevil run is single book with back board per bag.

I have the Tales to Astonish, and the pre 100 Spidermans in mylars at the moment.

 

Thanks for the information. I did wade through most the threads keying on words Storage, poly, bags, and mylar.

My findings were that some people leave their books in poly for years and dont notice any depreciation in the books.

I was just curious.

I figure I am going to take my more valuable books and double mylar them with back boards.

 

Artboy99

[divad]

Pardon me - that's a good sized collection! The double Mylar is a waste of money and resources - focus on getting them into what you like. Buy a hundred or so at a time and get to work. I think most board members prefer the fullbacks, but halfbacks and 2-mil mylars work well too.

 

I try to mylar and and microchamber paper any book over FN 6.0, but it can get costly.

[shadroch]

Forum member Comic Supply will give you a good deal on your supplies,with rapid delivery.50 mylars and 200 mylite2s won't run you much and wil let you get the gist of your better books protected right. It might be cheaper to buy the boards at your LCS as they are heavy and expensive to ship.He also offers what he calls a CGC alternative of a mylite,a mylar and board combo if you want to go for overkill.Check out his many,many posts in the marketpace section.

[Moondog]

The poly bags will be fine as long as you keep them in a cool, dark, dry place.

[Hobgoblin]

I've had many of my modern comics in regular comic bags for about 10+ years now. I have never changed them and nothing has happened to the comics whatsoever. I know I'll catch a lot of flack from board members on this, but I think it is a ploy to get collectors to purchase bags and boards more often. Polymers don't degrade easily. If they did, engineers wouldn't even bother using them for packaging. I'll continue to keep all my books in the same bags until I actually notice my X-Men (1991) #1 getting a little funky. But I haven't seen anything yet in nearly 15 years.

[Darthdiesel]

I think it has to do with the humidity in how fast your polybags become opaque. My modern comics from 89 and on up have never made their bags cloudy, but I've bought some older books from folks all over the country and some of them are in the original bags and are yellowed or musty. If you happen to be dealing with someone who took better care of their books, then it may not be a problem, but if someone just stored the books somewhere dark and musty for decades, I think the bags would be yellowed and books probably warped and crumbling by now..

[divad]

I've had many of my modern comics in regular comic bags for about 10+ years now. I have never changed them and nothing has happened to the comics whatsoever. I know I'll catch a lot of flack from board members on this, but I think it is a ploy to get collectors to purchase bags and boards more often. Polymers don't degrade easily. If they did, engineers wouldn't even bother using them for packaging. I'll continue to keep all my books in the same bags until I actually notice my X-Men (1991) #1 getting a little funky. But I haven't seen anything yet in nearly 15 years.

 

KH, This information is absolutely useless - he's got SA books that are over 35 years old - your books are as different from his as can be, as are the bags.

 

I'm happy that your 1991 and newer books are in great condition and show no sign of degradation, and the same goes for Darth. But we're talking REAL comics here, and preserving them.

 

Poly bags degrade. Period. Even in the best of storage environments. And if your boards are over 5 years old, chances are they are not even acidfree, never mind buffered.

 

Get your books into some decent archival materials or you'll be sorry.

 

At less than 35 cents a book you can put them into Mylite2's with buffered halfbacks - who loves their comics???

[Hobgoblin]

KH, This information is absolutely useless - he's got SA books that are over 35 years old - your books are as different from his as can be, as are the bags.

 

 

I'm just saying, I think chaning bags every few years is a waste of time/money. That was the point I intended to make. It had nothing to do with SA vs. Modern comics. Wow........

 

I'm happy that your 1991 and newer books are in great condition and show no sign of degradation, and the same goes for Darth. But we're talking REAL comics here, and preserving them.

 

Poly bags degrade. Period. Even in the best of storage environments. And if your boards are over 5 years old, chances are they are not even acidfree, never mind buffered.

 

P.S. I agree with Darth. It depends on the conditions they're kept in. When I see some of my older bags start to change in any way, shape or form, maybe I'll do something about it. Plus, as I previously stated, polymers (as in "poly" bags), are not easily degradeable if they are kept at the right temperature. Sure if your books are in the attic, something may happen to the bags with time due to the changes in temperature. But if they're kept at ambient room temperature (25 degrees Celcius), for 365 days a year, nothing should happen to them, or they need to remove the word "poly" from their name.

 

I'm happy that your 1991 and newer books are in great condition and show no sign of degradation, and the same goes for Darth. But we're talking REAL comics here, and preserving them.

 

P.S.S. What's with the hollier than thou attitude? My 90's book mean something to me. I don't care if you have an ASM #1 sitting in your collection. I'll never own one and I'm okay with that. Just because I have a bunch of 90's Spider-Man and X-Men books doesn't mean I don't have a "real" collection. It's my collection and I'm proud of it, whether or not everyone and their dog has the same books. So you say something else like that to me again and you can go yourself.

[Artboy99]

Thanks for all the replies.

I am going to upgrade to mylars as I can afford them. I will focus on my better books first, then go down from there. The only problem I forsee in getting this done is that my collection keeps growing exponentially. ( IE I cant stop buying comics..)

By the way, I absolutely love this board, and I am glad I found it. It is by far the most valuable comic resource out there. Additionally, I find it stimulates the market.

Example: never before have I had an interest in collecting Vampirella books/magazines. Then I read the post on favorite covers

http://boards.collectors-society.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=698807&page=0&fpart=4&vc=1&nt=7

and I suddenly have a strong desire to acquire those. Why? They combine my 2 favorite things into one: Comics and beautiful women. How can you go wrong?

By the way, to those of you that somehow managed to combine your comic collecting with the women in your life bravo. Please let me in on how you did it.

I am afraid I had to choose between mine a few years ago..

Heheh

 

Artboy99

[Hobgoblin]

By the way, to those of you that somehow managed to combine your comic collecting with the women in your life bravo. Please let me in on how you did it.

I am afraid I had to choose between mine a few years ago..

Heheh

 

Artboy99

 

I really, really, really hope you're joking.

 

If my girlfriend ever asked to choose between her or my collection, I'd sell it for every penny I could get. But, luckily, she supports my choice of a hobby.

[OldGuy]

If my girlfriend ever asked to choose between her or my collection, I'd sell it for every penny I could get. But, luckily, she supports my choice of a hobby.

 

If my GF gave me that choice I'd dump her and just stick with my wife.

[ComicSupply]

Poly bags will over time, no matter how they are kept degrade. They are organically made and will continue to decay no matter how you keep them.

 

The first thing that happens is the bag starts to wrinkle. Which is in all truth the acid moving back and forth. Acid is a fluid so it will move as such. Which is why you see the waves in the bags.

 

The second thing that will happen in addition to the first one happening is the bag will yellow. This is due to a number of reasons. Such as off gasing, acid migration and overall decay of the bag.

 

The third is that the bag is completely yellow and wavy or crinkly. This is the final step. The bag can no longer be decayed anymore and its seriously time to change it. The bag will start to get a little sticky and will stick to each other. What we see there is acid migration from bag to bag. Which is why sometimes when your dealing with old collections you see 30-40 comics stuck together like a brick.

 

Now, mylars on the other hand this will never happen to and have a lifetime 15-20x that of poly bags. On an economical level, its much better to spend $15-20 per 100 books and never change them. Than say $7-8 on poly bags and change them every say 10 years.

[Hobgoblin]

If my girlfriend ever asked to choose between her or my collection, I'd sell it for every penny I could get. But, luckily, she supports my choice of a hobby.

 

If my GF gave me that choice I'd dump her and just stick with my wife.

 

funny, but so so wrong

[Norrin_Radd]

Nice avatar KH.

 

[Hobgoblin]

Poly bags will over time, no matter how they are kept degrade. They are organically made and will continue to decay no matter how you keep them.

 

The first thing that happens is the bag starts to wrinkle. Which is in all truth the acid moving back and forth. Acid is a fluid so it will move as such. Which is why you see the waves in the bags.

 

The second thing that will happen in addition to the first one happening is the bag will yellow. This is due to a number of reasons. Such as off gasing, acid migration and overall decay of the bag.

 

The third is that the bag is completely yellow and wavy or crinkly. This is the final step. The bag can no longer be decayed anymore and its seriously time to change it. The bag will start to get a little sticky and will stick to each other. What we see there is acid migration from bag to bag. Which is why sometimes when your dealing with old collections you see 30-40 comics stuck together like a brick.

 

Now, mylars on the other hand this will never happen to and have a lifetime 15-20x that of poly bags. On an economical level, its much better to spend $15-20 per 100 books and never change them. Than say $7-8 on poly bags and change them every say 10 years.

 

I have yet to see anything of this sort ever happen, to my collection or anyone elses. I guess it happens, but my collection has not experienced any of these issues whatsoever. I do now keep my better books in mylars, but I'm still a fan of poly bags for general issues I collect.

[Hobgoblin]

Nice avatar KH.

 

 

Thanks Norrin. It really shows how some of these "hardcore, my collection is above all" board members make me feel.

[skybolt]

When I was collecting comic books back in the 80' and 90's, I was mainly concentrating on reading them. Therefore, in order to save my money to buy additional comics, I would place 3 of my books in one polybag and without a backing board. Then I would take about 20 of these polybags and place them in a larger bag, and finally in a box on top of each other. After about 14 years of storage in my bedroom, the bags had slightly wrinkled but thankfully weren't yellow. I did receive a couple of 9.8's (with white pages) on these books when I sent them to CGC. However, 2 years ago I purchased a box full of ASM's, Secret Wars, etc. from someone on eBay, and the polybags were completely yellow. Thankfully the books weren't damaged since the ones I sent in to CGC came back at 9.6 (nothing major - ASM #313, 316, 317, etc.)

[Hobgoblin]

When I was collecting comic books back in the 80' and 90's, I was mainly concentrating on reading them. Therefore, in order to save my money to buy additional comics, I would place 3 of my books in one polybag and without a backing board. Then I would take about 20 of these polybags and place them in a larger bag, and finally in a box on top of each other. After about 14 years of storage in my bedroom, the bags had slightly wrinkled but thankfully weren't yellow. I did receive a couple of 9.8's (with white pages) on these books when I sent them to CGC. However, 2 years ago I purchased a box full of ASM's, Secret Wars, etc. from someone on eBay, and the polybags were completely yellow. Thankfully the books weren't damaged since the ones I sent in to CGC came back at 9.6 (nothing major - ASM #313, 316, 317, etc.)

 

Yeah, I believe it honestly depends on the environment you keep them in. Obviously if you live I move to Florida in the next 6 months, I'm going to have to reconsider my comic storage.