Standard Acrylic - Safe or Avoid?

DuncanWylieWilson

Hello all.

This is a really generic question, but an interesting one nonetheless. Everybody has their own system and preferences, so opinions will differ here, but is standard, run of the mill acrylic plastic safe to use for coin storage? PVC is a no go - and that's not just limited to numismatic circles.

I use Lighthouse circle capsules with the black foam ring for all of my coins - even my prised ones. These are 'scratch resistant' acrylic. They're nice for me and do the job.

I also see, however, that you can get bog standard acrylic capsules. Are there coin safe or can these acrylics sometimes contain marginal amounts of harmful substances for coin storage? I was under the impression that acrylic was pretty standard. It can differ in terms of the level of UV protective treatment, but that's not an issue for me given that my coins are in their capsules and in the dark, haha.

Archival grade acrylic, for instance, is the same as all other acrylic except that it is 96 to 97% more effective at UV protection. Standard acrylic is around 92%. This is really much more relevant to art preservation, but I wanted to float this question regardless.

Long story short, is standard acrylic, like standard acrylic sheets with the protective film, safe around coins?

Cheers!