Canadian Transformers News and Discussion Forum

[Omegatron]

Sorry for being late to the party on this but I work in the museum sector so I have a bit to add here.

The problem with plastics is that they are not all created equal. Some are inert like polyethylene but others contain plasticizers and other impurities, like PVCs. The issue with storage materials is that you don’t want to introduce any new impurities or acids from the storage materials. It is also worth remembering that Transformers themselves are made from many different kinds of plastic and that some will deteriorate really no matter what you do (Vinyl tires anyone) because they are made of PVCs, contain plasticizers or fire retardants or just are made of plastic with is unstably bonded and so breaks down over time (and especially if energy is added to the reaction, which often occurs when you leave them in sunlight).

For this reason museums use materials which are acid free and made of stable materials. The number one supplier in Canada for this type of thing is Carr-McLean. Their web-site is as follows:

http://www.carrmclean.ca
For a direct link to the kind of bags I’d suggest here is the specific page:

http://www.carrmclean.ca/CategoryGroupBrowser.aspx?CategoryID=159&GroupNo=1 375

Now these bags are expensive, so it’s totally fair to decide if your collection is worth the expense. These are probably the best thing out there though. I should also say that impurities in regular plastic bags take time to leach out so if you are only using them for a month or two you would be fine with anything. Over time though (years generally, and the higher the temperature or the greater the light expose the sooner this will happen), the impurities will leach out and eventually affect your toys.

In terms of packing material, regular store grocery bags aren’t bad because they are generally made of polyethylene which is inert. I would turn them inside out though to prevent the logo, which is printed on, from transferring to your toys. The other problem with grocery bags is that they don’t actually provide much padding. For this reason museums usually turn to ethafoam which is a thicker, more padded form of polyethylene. This can be found on the Carr-McLean website here:

http://www.carrmclean.ca/CategoryGroupBrowser.aspx?GroupNo=2031

That being said most of these are blocks and sheets are better because they are more pliable. Carr-McLean also seems to be really expensive for this kind of thing so most museums in our area use ULine which is a packing company. The sheets I’d suggest from Uline are as follows:

https://www.uline.ca/BL_864/Foam-Sheets

Finally if anyone wants to shop around there is a competitor, its Brodart and their web-site is as follows:

http://www.brodart.ca

Brodart is also an American company so for our U.S. friends I’d suggest them over Carr-Mclean (which is Canadian) as their main U.S. site can be found here:

http://www.brodart.com

They tend to be more of library supplier than a museum or archive supplier (like Carr-McLean) but have many of the same items.

So, sorry for the essay, I get a bit too much into my work sometimes, but if this is of help to anyone then hopefully you’ll excuse my pontification.