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Cracking the slab...

Started by chromium,

24 posts in this topic

chromium

chromium

Posted
Posted

Ok, short and sweet... I bought a few mid-grade CGCed books that I want to read, so I want to liberate the puppies.

Does anybody have any pointers on how to crack the slab safely ?

I don't care what happens to the plastic, I just want to get the comics out without damaging them... confused.gif

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hammer-migration

hammer-migration

Posted
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C, Liberating them is easy and I'll give you a step by step on the safest way to do it, but in a way that it will be obvious that the slab and inner well as been opened (cracks and abrasions).

 

1) insert a medium sized screwdriver between the slab halves in the middle of the right long edge (only about 1/4 to 1/2 inch in...no where near the level of the comic itself) and push it upward as close to the corner as possible.

2) Turn the screwdriver counter-clockwise until the corner pops/cracks (this will leave VISIBLE evidence of tampering).

3) Once the corner is open, the long edge and the top edge will be open as well.

repeat the procedure for the top left corner.

4) Both corners will now be visibly cracked open. Remove the inner housing.

5) Some of the OLDER seals on this inner housing are not welded tightly and all that you need to do is separate the front and back at the top (already open at that point) and shear open with the hands alone. If the "welds"/seals are tight and unyielding:

6) With a sharp knife (not a scissors), very carefully cut across the shield approx. 1/4 inch above the comic, being extra careful NOT to exert pressure on the surface of the comic's top edge by pressing on the holder over that point.

7) Repeat for the right edge, and then the bottom edge and peel the top layer back, removing the comic carefully from the inner holder, not letting the comic make contact on its edges with any of the protruding plastic left behind.

 

Using these techniques to liberate a slabbed book, Neither the outer nor inner holders can be re-used to attempt fraud as both leave unreversable damage to the slab and interior housing.

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Mushroom

Mushroom

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Posted

I think you have hit on a great idea. Maybe we could band together and build a pit.com for CGC comics. We could call it "labelwhore.com". Certainly would save on postage and then people could flip to their hearts content and be able to show all their buddies the scans of their books without them having to be in the same location at the same time.

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chromium

chromium

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Ok; the evil deed is done....

 

Here's Pic #1.

I must admit cracking the outer slab was a LOT easier that I thought, took minimum of skill, no force and Hammer's notes (printout pictured) to get the thing to pop open.

 

crack1.jpg

 

Observation #1.... the marks that the case was opened were not that clear at all, not a single splinter of plastic broke off and I get the feeling that if I were to superglue the case back together it would only show a sort of hairline-crack.

Now that I've seen this I'm a lot more weary of buying books that have less than a perfect CGC case. The little scratch on the corner that you thought was from the case getting banged against something could be something completely different...

 

Observation #2....

The actual label is printed on what feels like everday paper, rather flimsy even. I was surprised as I expected a sort of plasticy-feel to the label

 

Here's Pic #2

The comic is half out of the inner housing, this was a lot tougher to accomplish than the outer case. I could not get the corner-welds open, instead of going all berserk over it I used a very sharp razor and cut the inner housing. This took some force and a steady hand...Note the dreaded date stamp smile.gif

 

crack2.jpg

 

 

Observation #3....

Once the inner case was opened I was greeted with that distinct smell of an old comic smile.gif Not the bad musty smell, but a smell that took me back to my childhood, I'm guessing the wood-grainy-pulpy smell (ok ok , YOU try to describe a smell...) built up over the years of entombment and was now set free cool.gif

 

Observation #4....

 

There are two sheets of the special secret-secret-hush-hush microfiber paper that CGC inserts in the book. I though they only used one, but there is one between both the first page and the cover and the last page and the cover....

 

 

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hammer-migration

hammer-migration

Posted
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In Italian, it's "butana" (pronounced boo-ton....the 'ton' sounding like won-ton or ba-ton). When verbally delivered properly, it's usually coupled with, "Butana!" acccccccchhhh (gathering pleghm in the mouth)...paaaaa-Tooooooey!! (spitting on floor in mock disgust) for maximum visual and emotive effect. laugh.gif

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