"storing 1/2400 scale ships?" Topic

I'm slowly building a collection of 1/2400 scale WW2 ships. I'm not basing them. Am looking for suggestions about how best to store them. Advice?

thanks

Plano boxes

I have mine in candy boxes, but they are based and mounted on magnetic sheets in the boxes.

If you are not going to base them I have two suggestions.
I94 link make their Mothball series. I'm not thrilled by them, often to short for larger models with masts but if you only have a few they are fine.

The next choice is to step up to the foam carriers, like Sabold or the others of that ilk.

A 1 inch high tray with half inch wide foam fingers will handle a lot of models. Some of the larger, taller models might require the inch and a half high foam tray. Most WW2 cruisers will easily fit into the half inch wide finger path.

As an example a Sabold tray is 24 fingers long and 13 wide, each finger a half inch by half inch.

At 7 fingers per cruiser, the seventh finger being a divider, you can do 3 cruisers across and 7 rows for 21 models. There is a void that is 3 fingers by 13 so running vertically you can do another 2 X 2 for a total of 25 cruisers on one tray.

Now Japanese heavy cruisers are generally longer so you won't get so many and you have to decide how to divvy up the tray.

The foam provides good soft protection. If the trays are in one of the various carrying bags even if you drop the thing the models should be fine, they will bounce against foam unlike Plano boxes.

I keep all my 1/3000 ships in 12x12 paper-crafters boxes lined with 'flex-o-metal'

link

Three of these hold about 300 ships easily.

I use three-drawer Sterilite boxes lined with magnetic business cards. The drawers are deep enough for 1:2400 models with masts and room to spare. The models are mounted on bases made from steel banding: 1/2" for ships up to CA size, and either 5/8" or 3/4", mostly the latter*, for capital ships. Works a treat.

*Scrap steel banding is getting harder to come by because packaging is trending toward plastic banding over steel. I have a fair amount of 1/2" on hand, but having more trouble finding 5/8" I broke down and bought a 300' roll of 3/4", because I can use the larger size for my 10mm SYW miniatures too. Even so I have enough to last my natural life and then some. :-)

This may not be for everyone, but I'm a cheapskate and do the following.

I make shelves out of cardboard & 1" foam sheets and place 5 or 6 layers of them in Sterlite 14"x 11" x 6 1/4" plastic boxes.

To make the shelves, I start with two layers of cardboard (corrigations at right angle) cut to fit the bottom of the box (the box gets bigger towards the top). This will be the base. Glue these together with white glue and put a heavy book on the cardboard until it cures A serrated knife and the edge of a table works for cutting the cardboard.

Take a sheet of 3/4" thick styrofoam (Home Depot store- used for insulation) and paint it both sides with spare latex paint. After it dries, mark 1" wide stripes on it (Sharpie pen) and cut it into strips with the serrated knife. Do it outdoors or in the garage as it will generate beads of static-charged foam. Then paint the white sides with the latex and stack them up to dry.

Now white glue the foam fingers onto the cardboard. Glue all the edges first and then the fingers with spaces wide enough to hold your ships. You can use little chunks to make individual compartments.

What you have are very light trays that keep the ships from rattling around and are stacked inside of the box. You can lift them out, you can write on the foam as to what ship is in what spot.

I also mount the ships on blue painted "popcycle sticks" from a craft store. You find these in the section where they have wooden stuff for assembling and painting. There are several sizes- I just use a DD DE size and a all other ships size. Paint one side to match your ocean matt and write the ship ID on the reverse side. White glue the ship on one end of the stick and then paint a white ship wake from the bow and stern.