Ok, I have been back building models for about a year now and (mainly thanks to Dragon) have started to acquire a large amount of spares. Now the question is, how do you all store them? Leave them on the sprue? cut them off and leave them loose? sort them in trays etc...

Any advice would be appreciated

Ian

Ian,
I like to save all the little baggies that the resin figures and accessories come in. I usually cut them away from the sprues and seperate them according to what they are: weapons, web gear, vehicle equipment, and then there is just parts that can't go in a catagory. I will either store them in box or in trays, what ever I can find. But the main thing is if I need a weapon, I just pull out my weapon tray or baggy, etc.

I cut them off the spure. I got a box that has small compartments, fishing tackle box, or sewing type box. I sort them by Allied Axis, scale, type.

I have one of those plastic organizers with the slide-out clear plastic bins that you can get at any hardware/home improvement store. They come in all manner of sizes and sometimes have various sized bins. On mine several bins are just large enough for a complete small 1/35 armor kit like a Marder or Sdkfz 251. Hey, ya never know when you might need to stash one aside for safe keeping. In one bin though I might store all my Mauser 98k's, in another all my M-1 rifles and carbines, another might just have other spare bits and pieces and so on.

I do the same as everyone above - trim the pieces away from the sprue trees and store in plastic containers according to type or function.

Jim

Ditto, I do the same as above.
But--- God forbid----- I actually throw a lot out, as I really haven't found a need for 125 German gas mask canisters lately. :-)

Ian:

You get lots of spare parts in those Dragon kits -- it's great, isn't it?

The back of my bench is a row of drawer storage bins of various sizes. Like the others, I cut large and medium size parts from the sprues, then sort them by country, vehicle, etc. Some drawers are marked, others are not. For things like leftover Dragon indy track links, I like to bag them and store them. Those multi-drawer stowage bins are handy and can be purchased relatively cheap at the big discount stores.

I'll swing against the current here, I leave them on the sprue, since the sprue has the kit name and or number molded right in.
But I do trim the sprue to fit into a gallon sized zip lock bag (freezer type) and lable the bags with a magic marker. I do usually trim away all the 'dead ends' inside the sprue, so that things do not snag on each other getting into and out of the bag.

Directions and remaining decals go in there too.

Somewhere I found a cardboard box almost exactly hte width of the zip lock bags, so I can stand them vertically, like bagged comic books.

Mike

Hello

Thanks to everyone for the responses. I figured that was the approach, I guess I had better start to sort out my parts box....

Cheers

ian

I guess I'm the only one that puts them in old shoe boxes?? I have like 75 modern DML figure kits that I put in plastic storage containers so I have started the switch over!!

Figures, I seperate into parts ... heads, left arms, right arms, left legs, torsos, etc.
Personal gear I seperate also, but also in nationality. For all these I use the compartment type boxes.
For AFVs, I seperate into large zip lockbags by the main chasis type (tiger, panther, Pzer IV, Pzr III, sherman, Sd.Kfz 251,etc.)
All stowage items I store together regardless of nationality ... makes looking for stowage more interesting as it offers lots of alternatives and things you wouldnt think of.

You could always use them in a WWI dio and have them spread all over the place after a gas attack, as if the soldiers couldn't get them on in time, which happend much too often.