Does the balsa wood in kits gradually degrade with time? I am talking over 10-15 years in storage (assume stored inside the house.)

Thanks.

YES. But as I am a good guy I will take all of your old balsa rare discontinued kits off you at your cost of postage.

Hi

No I dont think so. In fact sometimes the wood in older kits is of better quality. I wrap mine in plastic and tape it, to reduce humidity problems. plenty of kits out there from the 70s and 80s that have never been built. I have quite a few older SIG and PICA kits that are still in very good condition.


Vince

I've never had any problems with kits stored long term. I've held onto kits for probably 15yrs with no change in appearance. I've always kept them in a house usually in a dark, dry closet setting.. no major climate changes... A raw boxed wouldn't fare to well in the rafters of the garage though.. I think any exposure to the elements, even heat/cold/UV/etc.. does affect components... if not the balsa, the plans themselves are susceptible to deteriorating over time. Matter of fact my collectors planes(planes I'll never part with, and rarely fly) have been stored for many many years in same controlled environment/conditions with no problems.. and the covering is still in excellent shape. The planes that have seen many hours of UV/heat/cold are the ones that have changed. My 2cents.

I bought a couple of old LazyBee kits and found the balsa was very dry and brittle. It cracked very easy.

Probably stored in the attic!! I've had a couple of kits that are 15 to 20 yrs old & the wood was fine. Like degrant said, the plans & inst didn't hold up. I have a Goldberg Super Chipmonk (K52 kit) I've had for quite a while, the wood & everything else is just fine. The instructions have holes all over them. I would love to know how old the kit is.

Thanks all!

All of my kits are in great shape. I live in KY and the humidity and temperature swings can be great. Some old airframes in my attached garage are a little rough but everything inside perfect. I think the oldest kit I have is an origional Sterling Stearman (crummy wood anyway) or a Krick kit SG38.

What they said. Common sense dictates if you want anything half way decent to last...keep it out of the moldy, musty crawlspace. I have some kits that are easily 30 years old, and although the plans have somewhat yellowed, the contents are perfectly fine. I wrap the box in pallet wrap before I put it in a closet. The same closet with mothballed coats and linens, shoes, etc.

As long as you don't live in the Congo in a thatched roof home, you should be in good shape

Store them flat too, if you have them on there ends the wood will warp. Only thing I have seen was the wood would dry out and CA glue didn't bond well. I just opened the kit box and would leave the kit on the bathroom counter for a few days so as we showered the wood would take in a bit of moisture from the steam. That would take care of the CA curing problem. It doesn't take a lot of moisture to kick off the CA.

The only problem I have seen is the decals are sometimes unusable as in my old sterling ringmaster kit.

I just finished a Red Box P51B from 1969. Almost all of the wood was fine but the decals disinigrated when I tried to apply them. I had vinyl copies made.

Great idea for reconditioning the wood in bathroom! Use water based wood glue or Duco cement for best results. I hardly use CA- too hard to sand properly whereas the previously mentioned adhesives are so user friendly and inexpensive.