How to prevent ringwear (or is inevitable)

It is indeed difficult to comprehend how someone could be concerned enough about ring wear to post, but not concerned enough to do the one simple inexpensive thing to prevent it

 

Sorry if you're unable to comprehend but I can't be bothered to explain myself again for your benefit.

 

For everyone else who contributed helpful posts, thanks, that's what I like about this forum, the intelligent people who take the time to share their experience. When I started this thread I was opposed to the outer sleeves as I'm in the UK and the sleeves I'm exposed to have generally been either cloudy, oversized or both! However, after reading the opinions and experiences shared here I've taken it onboard and looked into the sleeves and discovered blake sleeves (which I've never heard of before). Consequently I put in an order online about 5 minutes ago to get enough to cover all my albums. This is something I wouldn't have imagined I'd be saying/doing a couple days ago.

So thanks again to everyone with constructive advice above as you've convinced me of what is the best solution and lead me to a solution I'm now actually excited about. To anyone who just wanted to take the opportunity to be snide, well, thank god for the ignore button

 

And thank you for taking us along on this dramatic emotional journey of personal evolution.

 

Thanks, you're welcome!

 

Reading the spines is the reason I started throwing out all the outer sleeves. So that is my opposition to them. The plastic starts bunching up, I can't read the spines, and some albums get missed in my browsing.

I just purchased two wooden crates to store my records so that I can flip front to back and also eliminate this problem. Not sure what I'll do once I get over 200 records. Cross that bridge later methinks. I would think careful handling of the records in and out of the sleeve would reduce ringwear. There are few albums I'm going to listen to more than a 100 times, and I'm pretty sure I can pull out and replace a record 100 time without showing ringwear. I'm going without out protective sleeves. Check back with me in 20 years to see if my experiment has failed or not. FWIW I also prefer no condom.

 

You my friend have excellent taste in music. Epic C and D collection. Interesting, i always files Derek and the Dominos under Clapton.

 

Excellent example of how outer jackets don't hamper reading spines at all.

 

I always slide the album in the outer sleeve so the spine is totally readable. Other people may align the outer sleeve opening with the record cover opening...that just doesn't provide the seal I want. I've done it this way for 40+ years.

 

Thanks...obviously that's just a random section.

 

zero ring wear, it is not ineveitable. fill your shelves loosely as carl recommended.

 

Ringwear is definitely a problem with US cardboard sleeeves, European sleeves have been laminated for as long as I can remember, no ringwear ever!

JG

 

I often wondered how much space I could save if I got rid of the thousands of plastic sleeves on my collection!

JG

 

Yeah, not rocket science. Remove the lp from the cover and store the whole thing in a plastic sleeve. No ringwear.

 

Use plastic outer sleeves on favorite &/or important albums. Done deal.

 

Ok you're in the Midwest as well. I'd almost be convinced you snuck into my house and took that photo. I have all but maybe 6 or 8 of the same ones! Even have two if the CSN!!!

 

Here's my "recent" pile (unsorted)



The biggest issue imo is making sure you don't use the side with the split in it for the spine, else it will obscure the titles. But as you can see, smaller spines are harder to read, especially the darker ones, but that would have been the case even without the plastic cover.

 

Bags Unlimited used to have an oversized outer poly sleeve also.

 

Do you also store the vinyl in its inner sleeve outside the album all within the protective outer sleeve?

 

Yep.

 

Is it essential to store the record outside of the jacket within the plastic sleeve to avoid ringwear? I like to see the back cover when going through my records. Also, which make of covers are you using?

 

The only way to avoid ring wear is abstinence

 

I use these currently: Resealable 33 Rpm Record Bags »

Not sure if it's essential to store on the outside - depends on the jacket itself and the outer album art (some show ring wear over time, others do not). I do it anyway mainly to reduce wear from removing and adding back on my shelf. Plus the bags are pretty cheap.