Question About 2x2 Plastic Pages

In a 2x2, your coins themselves should be well protected from any box or album you store the 2x2s in.

But what you might find is the 2x2's themselves can degrade if kept in the wrong type of plastic page. I've noticed "solvent migration" can occur from the album page into the 2x2 film, causing the film to go sticky on the outside, and hard to remove from the page.

The problem is made worse in hot weather or if the album is squeezed or compressed by, for instance, stacking several albums on top of each other and leaving them that way for years. The album on the bottom will almost certainly suffer from this effect.

The result isn't pleasant. I've been to coin shops and coin shows where the dealer has had to loan you a screwdriver, credit card or some similar wedge-shaped object so you can prise the 2x2s out of their albums. Not pretty.

There are two things you can do to avoid this.

First, don't keep albums stacked on top of each other. I keep my pages in binders that sit on a shelf, allowing the pages to hang vertically.

Second, use higher quality plastic pages. Personally, I steer completely clear of the ones made and sold specifically for coins. I've never owned one that wasn't prone to solvent migration.

Apparently, the photographic industry has done research into solvent migration (an effect which can ruin a photographic slide), and produced slide album pages that are far less prone to it. With the advent of digital cameras and the resultant demise of the photographic slide, these pages are getting harder to find, but a larger photographic supply store should still stock them. Last I checked, packs of 100 20-slot pages designed for 2x2 slides are still available at my local photo shop for for less than $40.

I've never had a problem with PrintFile brand pages.

Thanks for all your help. Desertgem: that link is especially helpful and I think I will be buying those pages instead. They're not that much more expensive.

Versus "high humidity" and careless "storage practices" can do some devestating things to "proof" coins or any coins really.....
I've just seen some recently that were carelessly stored for 35 years in U.S. Mint packaging (which wasn't or isn't airtight anyway) and the proof coins are badly degrading.....it's just sad !..

So far as notebooks go to hold the slide pages, I use these:

http://www.lightimpressionsdirect.c...mGroupId=347

They are stackable without squashing the one underneath and their square nature gives me room to toss in silica gel packs.

I've used Light Impressions stuff for storing a negatives and slides for many years.

There are many different types of those plastic pages you mentioned. I go to a lot of coin shows and they sell for about $0.10 each and up. Never saw any for more than $0.25 each. Almost all the dealers at these shows have many coins in 2x2's and in those 3 ringed binders with those plastic pages that hold 20 2x2's. I never have any problems getting the 2x2's out. Probably due to many years of usage they stretch a little. Some dealers have a little stick to push them out if your fingers are not good enough. I've got one binder full of proofs in 2x2's and in those 20 holder pages and they've been there for about 10 or more years. No problems that I can see.