Keep the records. I had minimal flood damage to the covers of records stored on the bottom shelves in my music room. If I would have had each album in clear plastic outer sleeves there would have been no covers wet and no damage. Fortunately I had most of the records themselves in Mo-Fi plastic inner sleeves and not paper sleeves. I never liked paper sleeves. Every wet-cover-record played perfectly. My wife toweled off each of a couple hundred lps and opened every gatefold lp and set out all lps all over the house to dry out. She is golden! After drying out the outer covers there was minimal damage. Keep those records!😁
500 albums in a basement flood--worth saving?
Hi--just had 6' high (relatively clean) water fill basement during recent hurricane/tropical storm. Lost everything down there including 500 albums: some late 60's rock, 70's & early 80's rock, some jazz and a few classical, most in pretty good shape prior to this. Couple of Original Master Recordings. No turntable at the moment. Insurance not covering. Question: is it worth peeling/discarding album covers, buying 500 new sleeves, buying record cleaning machine (lots of time & labor), or just toss the lot? Are they worth anything without the covers, just inner sleeves (what type are best, paper or plastic?)? What is average value? TIA.