sword storage and desiccants

[Miguel]

Originally Posted by oldschldude

Hello Everyone,
Been coming to this site for a while. I have a question about desiccant packs while storing Moro weapons. Does people here use desiccant packs in their gun safe or cabinet storage to protect their swords? What are the desiccants effects on the wood, blade, bone, or ivory? Thank you for your inputs. Ced

Hi
I am just examining my collection after being in storage for approx. 20 years. I can tell you that they have and are being stored in my loft in wooden crates I had made and lined with waterproof paper. They were all given a good coating of WD40 removed from their scabbards and separated from each other ie not touching. Some I encased in Nylon sleeves, given to me by a friend, some I wrapped in cloth and others I did not wrap in anything. Around the inside of the box I hung bags of Silica gel. I was apprehensive as to what rusting I would find when taking the lids off my crates after all that time but was relieved to find that my method had worked in most cases bearing in mind that I have stored over 200 items in the crates and only 2 or 3 were affected and this was probably due to my handling when putting them in the crates in the first place. I don't know whether I have been lucky or not but the only difference I am making to my method is using oil in place of WD40 and this is because I was informed that oil would be better for longer periods of storage. In your case if you are only storing for a few months WD40 , removing from their scabbards and not touching each other should be more than adequate.
Miguel