Thanks. And yeah I recently discovered the use of the silica desiccants. I had a few lying around the house and started using them a couple weeks ago, and also asked my fiancee to give me any she encounters through purchases.
Unfortunately the bulk of my cards were purchased/traded for and stored when I was a preteen or young teenager, so I didn't worry too much about proper long-term storage.I also did not know that curling was a thing until I moved to Georgia several years ago and saw it first hand. Anyways if anyone is interested in the longer story, here it is:
Thankfully 10-13 year old me had the wherewithal to put most of my rares/foils in a binder, but a lot of my Pokemon and Yugioh cards were thrown in boxes and left in a garage, and my mom probably gave them away to my nieces and nephews. What did remain was a binder of Pokemon holos and promos with about 1/3 of them in penny sleeves, sometimes two or three cards per sleeve, and the rest unsleeved. I guess Pokemon cards don't curl or bend as much because they were left in the binder for probably 12 or 13 years and have minimal curling and the cards are mostly in the condition they were probably in when put in the binder, save for a couple cards which got stuck to the sleeve. Or maybe the Pokemon cards were stored in dryer conditions than my Magic cards, as when I moved to Atlanta for grad school in 2013 I left my Pokemon cards in Michigan (I honestly think I just forgot about them) and brought my Magic stuff with me. After a year of being stored in a closet in my guest room, I noticed my Magic foils curling immensely, particularly ones I left just sleeved and not in a top loader in my deck case. I never knew it was a thing that foils did, but some were damaged/warped, some stuff to the pages, and others permanently curled. That's when I immediately starting using toploaders but did still not know about silica packs or that double sleeving was really a thing. But at least the toploaders seemed to do the trick as most the stuff hasn't appeared to warp further after another few years of storage. Now I know to make sure to double sleeve in a proper zippered binder/portfolio, use toploaders for foils, and use the silica packs.
Recently took out my collection of MTG cards after they had more or less been sitting untouched since the original Zendikar and Scars era (also my Pokemon cards which had been mostly untouched for even longer). Some of the foils had intense curling and warping because they were either unsleeved in a binder or just in a penny sleeve. Also a lot of the Pokemon cards had stuck to the sleeve and or page. I've gotten back into playing Magic but also am upgrading how I store the cards now that I've watched the Tolarian Community College videos and have a better understanding of the importance of using proper fitting sleeves, and double sleeving.
I'm using KMC Perfect Fits as inners but am not sure what to use for the outer sleeves. The main issue is the cost, I have literally hundreds of those 9-page Ultra Pro sheets worth of Pokemon and Magic cards that I need to secure as well as a couple hundred original Zendikar foil lands. The reviews that I have seen for sleeves are usually for playing but I'm sleeving these solely for long-term storage while also slowly selling off my collection to pay for additional accessories and newer cards. As such, I would like to avoid paying $8-9 for a pack of UP Eclipse, Dragon Shields, KMC Hypers, etc. as my outer sleeves do not need to be ideal for playing, they just should be tighter than penny sleeves and okay for storage. I've also been slowly migrating most of my $5+ foils into toploaders and a separate box, so again these sleeves do not have to be super high quality. I've been using these really old metallic Ultra Pros that I had from years ago, and they do the job really well...just ran out of them.
Any recommendations?
EDIT: By outer sleeve I do not mean the KMC Character sized sleeves, but the 66 x 91 mm standard sleeve size that are a grade above penny sleeves but ideally do not cost 8-12 cents per.
Unfortunately the bulk of my cards were purchased/traded for and stored when I was a preteen or young teenager, so I didn't worry too much about proper long-term storage.I also did not know that curling was a thing until I moved to Georgia several years ago and saw it first hand. Anyways if anyone is interested in the longer story, here it is:
Thankfully 10-13 year old me had the wherewithal to put most of my rares/foils in a binder, but a lot of my Pokemon and Yugioh cards were thrown in boxes and left in a garage, and my mom probably gave them away to my nieces and nephews. What did remain was a binder of Pokemon holos and promos with about 1/3 of them in penny sleeves, sometimes two or three cards per sleeve, and the rest unsleeved. I guess Pokemon cards don't curl or bend as much because they were left in the binder for probably 12 or 13 years and have minimal curling and the cards are mostly in the condition they were probably in when put in the binder, save for a couple cards which got stuck to the sleeve. Or maybe the Pokemon cards were stored in dryer conditions than my Magic cards, as when I moved to Atlanta for grad school in 2013 I left my Pokemon cards in Michigan (I honestly think I just forgot about them) and brought my Magic stuff with me. After a year of being stored in a closet in my guest room, I noticed my Magic foils curling immensely, particularly ones I left just sleeved and not in a top loader in my deck case. I never knew it was a thing that foils did, but some were damaged/warped, some stuff to the pages, and others permanently curled. That's when I immediately starting using toploaders but did still not know about silica packs or that double sleeving was really a thing. But at least the toploaders seemed to do the trick as most the stuff hasn't appeared to warp further after another few years of storage. Now I know to make sure to double sleeve in a proper zippered binder/portfolio, use toploaders for foils, and use the silica packs.
Recently took out my collection of MTG cards after they had more or less been sitting untouched since the original Zendikar and Scars era (also my Pokemon cards which had been mostly untouched for even longer). Some of the foils had intense curling and warping because they were either unsleeved in a binder or just in a penny sleeve. Also a lot of the Pokemon cards had stuck to the sleeve and or page. I've gotten back into playing Magic but also am upgrading how I store the cards now that I've watched the Tolarian Community College videos and have a better understanding of the importance of using proper fitting sleeves, and double sleeving.
I'm using KMC Perfect Fits as inners but am not sure what to use for the outer sleeves. The main issue is the cost, I have literally hundreds of those 9-page Ultra Pro sheets worth of Pokemon and Magic cards that I need to secure as well as a couple hundred original Zendikar foil lands. The reviews that I have seen for sleeves are usually for playing but I'm sleeving these solely for long-term storage while also slowly selling off my collection to pay for additional accessories and newer cards. As such, I would like to avoid paying $8-9 for a pack of UP Eclipse, Dragon Shields, KMC Hypers, etc. as my outer sleeves do not need to be ideal for playing, they just should be tighter than penny sleeves and okay for storage. I've also been slowly migrating most of my $5+ foils into toploaders and a separate box, so again these sleeves do not have to be super high quality. I've been using these really old metallic Ultra Pros that I had from years ago, and they do the job really well...just ran out of them.
Any recommendations?
EDIT: By outer sleeve I do not mean the KMC Character sized sleeves, but the 66 x 91 mm standard sleeve size that are a grade above penny sleeves but ideally do not cost 8-12 cents per.