I'm a bit perplexed by some of the points of view thrown around in the Boba Fett debate, so I thought I would start a poll to see what people look for when they choose collectibles.
tomandshell said:I feel like the durability and longer life issue is kind of up to me as a collector. If I see a really fragile piece, I know that I need to be careful with it.
Amanaman said:If the question was "What do you look for in a woman?" then 100% of the votes would go to #2
Conservatorial practices for the serious minded collector (very long text)
Posted by Dr. Venkman on February 19, 2005 at 07:12:18:
The Good Doctor has noted lately, several questions involving
the preservation of collections. I salute this concern, while at the
same time trying not to have more of this concern than is
reasonable . However, as I have worked in a major museum for
the last 20 years, and in others past that, I have managed to pick
up some knowledge that may be of interest to others on this site.
I am upfront with the fact that I follow almost none of these
practices. It is too costly and time consuming for my taste. I
collect for fun not for investment or the ages, but if you are so
inclined, below are some general rules and concepts.
There are 6 major killers of man made (and natural) objects, and
each affects different materials differently, and would have to be
addressed differently in any museum situation, by the curator.
These are temperature extremes, moisture, light, and living
creatures, what we may term here, pollution, and time. Each
potentially pose a danger for any material but some more than
others. Combinations of these factors result in the greatest
damage.
Temperature extremes are great destroyers but are potentially
the easiest in a modern society to control. Extreme cold is the
least dangerous to most materials, but changes from a very cold
environment to one that is warm places great strain on flexible
plastics and paper products. If you keep the temperature in your
home a a constant level, most of this danger disappears.
Personally, my collection is so large that I must keep a good
portion of it in the attic which I do not ,make any attempt to cool in
the summer, other that to open some windows so as to keep the
house a little cooler. The heat there has yellowed some plastics
and fogged some clear ones. Heat above, say 120 degrees, to
pick a number almost at random, will affect plastic and paper to
some degress and over time will add up to significant potential
damage. Do what you can to keep temperatures steady and
within a comfort zone if preservation is your goal.
Moisture is the great killers of paper products and metal toys,
with the vast majority of plastics being relatively immune.
Moisture in the form of visible water is absolute death to paper,
and in the form of humidity destroys most metals over time,
especially those toys are made of, and will eventually add up to
the destruction of paper. This is not an easy problem to solve in
the home, or in storage facilities available to most people. A
dehumidifier in the heating and cooling system, or a
freestanding unit will help, especially in the deep south where
humidity in the summer often is 70 percent or above. Beyond that
I can give little counsel that will be of any real assistance.
However should you have a paper item that becomes wet, and
you have some desire to try to save it, as much as possible at
any rate, immediately freeze it. Then on a periodic basis pull it
from the freezer long enough to give it a good shake to loosen
the frozen water and then replace it in the freezer. Continue this
until all the frost is gone from the paper and then press the item.
It will never return to its former condition but this is the best
process available to the averge person. Metal toys can be given
some protection by a light coat of paste wax.
Light yellows and fades. All inks and paints contain materials
that create their colors and all are transient to some extent in the
presence of light, and sunlight is the worst killer here. Keep all
materials out of the sunlight and if they are particularly valuable
to you, but you wish to display them, get a container that is UV
proof. Otherwise, given time, they will fade.
Living creatures, and generally here one means vermin, are
dangers to paper and plastics in particular. I lost a Mego Star
Trek alien to mice when one found its way into a storage box and
out of hunger or boredom chewed it into tiny bits and fragments.
Paper mites and other insects will chew holes in paper to an
amazing degree and all cloth materials are very vulnerable to
moths and their young. Moth balls around, but not in contact with
the collection will help as will mouse traps. I prefer live traps so
that I can release the mice in a safe location and urge the same
sense of kindness on all others.
Pollution as I use it here is meant as airborne chemicals caused
by modern industry, including common household goods. It
cannot be avoided but can be minimized. Central heat and air
can help not just with temperature and moisture but with this as
well. If your unit can use HEPA filters, some pollution will also be
restrained. Use only the mildest of cleansers, I recommend Dr.
Bronners liquid soap available in health food stores, on your
collection and keep them in dust proof, and if possible, air tight
containers. Eventually quite costly and space robbing, but this is
principle not practice. No smoking in any real museum. Does
that answer all questions about smoking around your collection?
Time destroys all things, some faster than others. Can you
preserve your collection through your lifetime? It depends on the
materials they are made of and how much you are willing to
spend on its preservation. Personally I intend to enjoy my toys
and let the chips fall where they may. I personally think that
collecting as a long term investment is a fools errand, and most
agree, hence scalpers, who strive to make their profit while there
is profit to be made. Some items, like my comics I will pass on to
my children as they have some interest in them as reading
matter, but they already have expressed no interest in the toys so
I may at some time catalogue them and donate to a museum. Or
not. Hopefully that is a long time in the future. Remember,
everything you have once belonged to someone else and will, at
some time in the future belong to someone other than yourself,
and that universal phrase " This too shall pass."
I totally agree and thought that I had made theat clear but.....
apparently I had not. There are additional concerns as well that I
did not address in the previous posting.
The newer plastics that are flexible, such as capes and pieces of
clothing, are probably, at least in my opinion, of particularly short
lifespans. Probably a few dozen years at best. Additionally all
plastics outgas materials and while there are no long range
studies that I am aware of, those that keep their toys in the
packages may be damaging them more than those that remove
them. I would listen to arguements the other way of course, but
until enough time passes, the wuestion is moot.
In general practice items should be stored as flat as possible, in
a single layer, on an inert surface such as stone (completely
impractable) or unpainted hardwood. If you have paper produsts
they should be kept with a layer of archival material between
each item. But as I stated in the first post, time eventually
returnes everything to the dust from whence it came.
Why Plastics Yellow
By Matt Guzy
Ok, one of the often-asked questions is "why is my vintage StormTrooper (or GI Joe Snowjob) turning yellow... and how should I store my figures so this doesn't happen?" I'm a graduate student in Chemical Engineering at Virginia Tech with a polymer background. I'm also an action figure collector and occasional toy columnist. I thought I may shed some light (no pun intended, well actually...) on the topic of aging and discoloration of figures and address a few things in both the question and your answer.
While there's been formal research done on the topic, it's going to be tough to find. I don't know what kind of library you have around you, but any book on polymer photodegradation should give you some basic info, which is what I'll try to do here. But I have to point out that its a complicated issue. I don't know what specific polymer figures are made of. I can make a guess, but well, I won't. I do know that different materials are used for different parts of figures, for example, the torso and limbs of POTF2 figures are different polymers. Same goes for vintage too, I think. I tried getting some information on this out of a few companies for a column I'd like to write, but they aren't sharing. Without that information I can't give you specific references, sorry.
Ok, quick crash course in polymer chemistry. Polymers are large molecules that are made up of many units of a smaller molecule, the monomer. And I mean large, polymers can have thousands and thousands of these units in a chain. What your figures are made of is a mixture of a polymer (or more than one) and a bunch of additives. For example there's probably a UV-absorber (I'll get back to this), plasticizer (same here), unreacted catalyst, short chains of polymer, and unreacted monomers. These aren't simple materials, and the properties of the material are governed in part by this mixture of components.
Alright...moving on to photodegradation. Most people will say keep your toys out of direct sunlight and that's totally right. In fact, that's what causes the discoloration in vintage StormTroopers and Snow Job. This discoloration is the effect of interactions of the material and UV-radiation (light, but the UV wavelength range is the problem-causing area). If you go to https://www.unc.edu/depts/chemistry/faculty/mdef/polymer.html, you'll see a few photodegradation reactions. In both cases there, a piece of the polymer molecule is broken off of the main chain and creates a free radical. These free radicals cause all sorts of problems. Damage may be manifest through discoloration, chalking, blistering, brittleness, loss of strength, warping and cracking. What I'm saying is that there's a whole lot going on. I think that the discoloration that occurs results from a change in the electronic structure of the polymer backbone, which will change its absorbance spectrum and its color, but don't hold me to that.
What polymer chemists do is add materials to the polymer blends to prevent this. That's where the UV-absorbers come in. These chemicals gobble up the radicals that are produced, preventing them from reacting on their own. But these materials can only prolong the life of the polymers, not extend them indefinately. But if you keep the figs out of direct sunlight newer figures should last a long, long time. Polymer technologies have come a long way in 20 years, and we get to take advantage of that.
People also say not to smoke around toys... but that's just a stain, not anything chemical.
Ok... one last thing. A word about plasticizers. Actually quite a few words about plasticizers. Firstly they're materials that are added to polymers to make them more flexible and easily processible (the injection molding step for example). You know that smell when you open a McFarlane figure? That's plasticizer. New car smell? Plasticizer. In time and with exposure to heat, plasticizer will evaporate out of the material...as my car's dash will support. The loss of plasticizer causes materials to become more brittle and rigid.
Wrapping this up... you don't need to worry about your figures turning into a puddle of goo. Unless you melt them, which I don't suggest because that can kill you. There is genuine concern regarding discoloration, but if you keep your figures out of direct sunlight they'll last a long time.