Reversing water damage on magazines?

**White Knight** · 01-22-2010, 03:18 PM

Is there any way to do this? Back in 2001, I had a huge flood. Many things were damaged. I had kept my magazines under my bed, and many of the bottom issues got soaked. Some were very rare, like the complete set of Sega Challenge magazines. I still have them today, but the pages are stuck together. The ink is still there, smear proof. Any way to reverse this? I was thinking of re-soaking them in water, then opening the pages and drying them while open. Would this work? Any other tricks?

**bluehawk2000** · 01-22-2010, 03:22 PM

sounds like they are just damaged beyond repair to me, sounds like your outta luck!!! you can try it I suppose but I am sure you still wont get much for them later one because of that.

**cuervo25_1** · 01-22-2010, 03:46 PM

hmmm you sure it was water damage and sega challenge mags?

Yea your screwed unfortunatly. no matter how rare they are with the pages messed up like that they are worthless. Sorry but it is the truth.

**67CamaroRSSS** · 01-22-2010, 06:01 PM

Originally Posted by cuervo25_1

hmmm you sure it was water damage and sega challenge mags?

Took the words right outta my mouth...

**wheeliE-maxx** · 01-22-2010, 06:05 PM

Clothes steaming machine might work.

**86 IROC-Z** · 01-22-2010, 06:10 PM

couldn't have been that important if you let dey get flooded on man

**310stanger** · 01-22-2010, 06:13 PM

paper and water = destroyed.

**Zapper2003** · 01-22-2010, 07:05 PM

Now I dont know about currently dried been wet before magazines, but I know that FreezeDrying is used sometimes. Freezing the wet magazine/book/whatever in a freezer for so long that the water assimilates back to a gas and leaves you with a usable copy of your original without smearing etc. Might be worth a try?

**White Knight** · 01-22-2010, 07:47 PM

Originally Posted by Zapper2003

Now I dont know about currently dried been wet before magazines, but I know that FreezeDrying is used sometimes. Freezing the wet magazine/book/whatever in a freezer for so long that the water assimilates back to a gas and leaves you with a usable copy of your original without smearing etc. Might be worth a try?

Thanks, I'll give it a shot. I just re-wet one issue as a test, and threw it in the freezer.

How long should I leave it in there, and when I take it out, then what? Won't it get wet again as it melts?

**White Knight** · 01-22-2010, 07:49 PM

Originally Posted by 86 IROC-Z

couldn't have been that important if you let dey get flooded on man

I didn't "let" them get flooded, I was foolishly caught off guard 9 years ago. If I knew how rare they were I would have protected them instead of being stacked under my bed at the time.

**Zapper2003** · 01-23-2010, 07:51 AM

Originally Posted by White Knight

Thanks, I'll give it a shot. I just re-wet one issue as a test, and threw it in the freezer.

How long should I leave it in there, and when I take it out, then what? Won't it get wet again as it melts?

Hence the term freeze Drying. It's gonna take a long time. Think of an icecube tray. You fill the thing up to the top with water to make cubes, but 'magically' over time they seem to shrink and get smaller. They're just turning back into a gas and 'disappearing'. Same works for freeze drying anything. You leave the wet object in there long enough and the water should just go away. I wouldn't jump the gun as to letting it hang out in there for a couple days and pull it out, this could take months given the limited cooling capacity of your home fridge freezer. I have a pretty good idea that freeze-drying in a commercial setting would be using liquid nitrogen or some other sort of super-cooling procedure.