Re-Sleeving your Record Collection!

I’ve purchased some great new vinyl of late and recently took delivery of some new polypropylene record sleeves. I get asked lots of questions about how I sleeve and house my records, so I figured I’d write an article about re-sleeving your record collection!

There are two main types of record outer sleeves: polyethylene and polypropylene. The polyethylene types often have zip-lock seal at one end, sometimes not, they are soft and look nice when new, but they quickly turn cloudy and they tear easily. This means they can end up looking tatty pretty quickly and they don’t present your vinyl in the best way.

The better sleeves to get are polypropylene or poly-p sleeves. These are much clearer optically, so record covers look amazing through them. They also don’t turn cloudy and are much more robust and less prone to tearing, so they stay looking good and keep your records looking beautiful.

Once you have decided to get some poly-p sleeves, you just need to decide what thickness to buy. I went for 700 of the 2 mil thick sleeves. This is about as thin as you want to go. It means you can store lots of records in a small space though, as the sleeves are not adding to the combined record thickness. The thicker 3 and 5 mil thick sleeves feel great and offer über protection, but they add considerably to the thickness of a 50 record stack, so just bear this in mind. Where space is not an issue, these might be ideal.

Below are a few pics of my records in these great poly-p sleeves. I’ve also shot an image of half of my records in one section of storage in poly-p sleeves (on the right) versus half in old poly-e sleeves. You can see the difference in clarity on the spines of the records and see just how much neater the whole stack looks in the clear poly-p sleeves.

I went with these Cardboard Gold types, from a company called Columbia Sportscard. I ordered these particular sleeves and I am quite happy with them – image below!

Polypropylene record sleeves
These were purchased form a seller on eBay and I must say that I am very happy with them. They are ultra-clear and feel nice in the hand. They also fit gatefold and double albums with ease.
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A few classics here. I could really have taken record shots all night but I needed to re-sleeve the damn things!
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Polyethylene sleeved records on the left, polypropylene sleeved records on the right – spot the difference anyone..?!
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Ah yes, a classic this one, especially if you are a drummer as I am.
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This one is for all my Kiwi buddies out there, including Sean Miller!
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Metal on the left, jazz, oldies and oddities on the right, all re-sleeved. Note how well the Opeth double 180 g records on the left fit these new 2 mil polypropylene sleeves.
Re-sleeving your records
I love the neatness, what an improvement!

4 thoughts on “Re-Sleeving your Record Collection!”

  1. Hi Mike and Mike-followers-fans (Mike-ettes ?)

    I’ve found it reasonably staightforward to obtain LP plastic sleeves, but does anyone have suggestions for where to find good quality equivalent clear plastic sleeves for CDs, especially those in the cardboard covers and digipaks, please?

    Many recent-release CDs seem to come in the flimsiest of thin card covers that won’t stand regular shuffling between my home and car systems (my 2007-era car has quite a nice CD stacker system). I also seem to be accumulating remstered CD reissues of classic Atlantic, Verve, and Blue Note jazz and soul albums of the ’50s and ’60s as well as ’70s-’80s rock reissues which often have the thicker bi-fold and tri-fold digipacks including nice booklets that I’d like to protect. The standard CD-R plastic cover sleeve is much too thin and fragile for these.

    Suggestions please, folks! 🙂

    Rob, in Melbourne

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