Featured Goodbye cardboard holders

After reading all I could find on this great CT community about how to storage coins I decided to say goodbye to my cardboard holders. Not an easy decision to make cause this means a whole, whole lot of work

Why did I decide to quit those holders?

1. You cannot get the coin out without destroying the holder. For me that is a big problem!
2. Big coins (sestertii) don’t fit easily....
3. There is not much space to write things down, especially with those big coins.
4. I somehow never seem to have cardboard holders in the good size.
5. IMO coins don’t look that nice in those holders.....

What next ?
I was not sure what the best choice was: envelopes or flips. I decided to go for saflips and didn’t regret it for one moment. Why not ?

1. These saflips are wonderful. I have no problem handling them and they don’t crack (anyway mine don’t....).
2. You can go throug your coins and see every coin. A big plus for me.
3. Mine came with handy inserts with lots of room for information.
4. IMO the coins look great in those flips

My handwriting is terrible so I decided to use a labelmaker for the following information, in three lines:
Number (from my datebase) + name emperor (or other name)
Type of coin + size + weight
RIC (or other identification) number.
For me that is enough to identify the coin. All the other information is in my database.



I decided to hire a safe deposit where I’ll bring most of my coins. Some of them I’ll keep at home. I am working out some sort of roulating system.

This was coin number 64, meaning a long, long way to go yet....

Btw. I bought these saflips from a U.S. shop cause I couldn’t find them in The Netherlands or elsewhere in Europe. That makes them rather expensive.....
If someone knows a cheaper place to buy them I would love to hear it.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Nice, I never bothered with the cardboard for ancients. They just are not practical, for me anyway.

I tried other ways also and always go back to saflips. Not a fan of them scuffing up and such, but there are tradeoffs for all holders.

 

I used Saflips and the switched to a different brand. The problem with all of the non-softened plastic flips is that they are brittle. Sometimes large coins + time will cause them to crack open even without handling the coin. Saflips only tolerate a few openings/closings before they break at the fold. There are brands that use similar material but thicker and slightly more crack resistant.

Knowing I'll have to replace them periodically, I bought a case of 1000 Guardhouse archival vinyl flips.

 

I never liked those lighthouse flips, I need some more 2x2 saflips but they are hard to buy in the UK only a few sellers and they try charge a fortune

 

Like TIF, I prefer the Guardhouse types as well, and Wizard has the best prices from what I've seen. I used to use Saflips, so I have a mix. There's nothing wrong with Saflips (no need to rush to replace them or second guess buying those), I just find these hold up a bit better.

 

Paper envelopes for me. I used flips for awhile but they crack. Lots of room to write down coin information on envelopes, in my tiny scrawl.

 

Since you are from Holland, you have probably checked this site out already. Here it is, in case you dont know it. They have flips there too, not sure if they are what you are looking for.

 

I know this site, thanks !
Problem is that I don’t trust those flips. I’m not sure they are pvc free.

 

I have been much happier since I changed to Lidner trays. Except for when I dropped two of them.

 

All,

I use rigid plastic flips too but I decided NOT to fold them. I do have to use more boxes of coins but the layout allows me to add desiccants to the boxes. When the latest boxes are full I store them in a safe place. Those are Whitman blue plastic boxes.



- Broucheion

 

I use Saflips currently...and thinking about switching to enelopes. Saflips are great for seeing your coins but terrible for thick coins and eventually crack. Maybe you can find a better price at Vcoins? Look for the seller ET Kointainer, I believe that's the manufacturer. The price per quantity is the best I've seen and they come with a red storage box.

 

Seen those I asked them about shipping, they charge £37 for those saflips + box to europe

 

Ouch!

 

Saflips are expensive wherever you buy them. I would save them for silver coins and use something softer for bronze.

 

I've now gone through 4 storage methods, though none of the coins in my current collection have been through all 4. I started with the cardboard holders, then went to SAFLIPs, then paper envelopes and most recently Abafil trays. This is by far the least space efficient method I've used but I love being able to see and handle all my coins without opening any envelopes or anything and I was planning to buy one of the small half sized Abafils for sharing coins with friends so I decided to move the whole collection to them. I only recently made the switch so I'm still in the process of creating a tag for each coin and lining each tray with SAFLIP material(to avoid the coins being scuffed by the tags).


I had my eye on these for years but was hung up on the cost of the trays and space efficiency. My order came out to about $2.50 per slot for the trays in the sizes I ordered(mostly 20 slot because I have lots of big bronzes but one 35 slot for later coins, mostly denarii). That's a fraction of the average price I pay per coin. As far as space efficiency I have a fairly average size safe deposit box and I should be able to store about 215-230 coins in the 5-tray briefcases along with my aes grave/aes rude box. That's about double the size of my current collection which I've built over the past 5 years, so I've got a few years to grow and in the meantime am on the list to get a bigger box or another of equal size, whichever is available first and I usually have a few coins at home anyways, so I have time to figure out the space efficiency issues. When I thought about it that way it was really a no brainer for me to switch to trays but the best storage solution for a given person will depend on personal needs and tastes.

 

Agree. I do not like looking at coins through plastic so if I have to remove the coin I might as well use paper. I preferred trays but when a collection hits a certain number the added bulk of trays and cases became a problem to me.

 

I love going through my coins and decide which one I want to take a closer look at (hold in hand). Therefore envelopes absolutely don’t work for me. I want to see those coins
I do love Abafil trays. Not handy for storage in a safe deposit (too much space) but probably ideal for a rotating collection of coins that stays at home

 

Abafil trays. Accept no substitute.

 

I also prefer the Guardhouse flips over the Saflips. Guardhouse is thicker, less brittle, and has rounded edges. Some even come with their own archival quality inserts that you can write your attribution on. I insert the old tags behind the new and keep everything in a folder for easy storage and viewing.

 

Collectors of early US copper coins keep them in soft cotton liners inside 2 x 2 paper envelopes. The more paranoid of us put them in polyethylene bags inside the cotton liners. When folded, the bags are essentially air-tight.