Oscar

This doesn't really have anything to do with books, but look! An Oscar!

Half Leather Reback - Private Job

This is a repair I worked on during my weekly class. These are the before treatment images.

It follows the same basic guidelines as my previous entry, with a few additional steps. Because the leather extended further on to the boards, I had to infill the board with a thick paper (I used water color paper), to make the transition smoother. The paper used to infill was left one millimeter away from the lifted cover material. This gap allows the new spine material to fit flush underneath the cover materials.
I also did some gold tooling along the spine (using a template I made of the original lines) and reattached the original label, lined with Morike so it reached the shoulders. These are images of the finished book.

Rebacking Half Bound Books

I have worked on several reback repairs, but not any on half bound books until recently. What I mean by half bound is that the spine material differed from the covers. For this particular book, the spine was book cloth and the boards were covered in paper. The text block had fallen out of the case and the spine was only attached to one cover.

I cleaned and lined the text block, then worked on the boards. The difference between this book and other reback repairs is that the excess book cloth on the covers is removed, flush with the paper. This creates a smoother transition between the new spine and cover materials.
Once the book cloth was removed I lifted the paper slightly, so the Morike will fit underneath it. Then I proceeded to attach the text block and repair the case as usual. This is the completed repair.

I worked on a similar repair in my class, which I will post when I have the pictures.

Previous Repair

I came across these two book on the end processing cart, which had previously been repaired in some way. Strike had a oxford hollow added to the spine which was keeping the spine piece attached.

With the Pictorial Family Encyclopedia, the spine was glued directly to the original lining to keep in in place. Also, the joints had been covered with strips of book cloth at some point which were delaminting.

My first step on both was to remove the spine piece. For Strike, I took a scalpel and cut the hollow at the joint, being careful not to damage the spine piece. For the encyclopedia, I was lucky because the original lining the spine piece was glued directly to was delaminating. I was able to totally remove the spine with a spatula. Next, I removed as much as I could of the old linings on both spine pieces with a spatula, and set the pieces aside.
From this point on, the encyclopedia became a standard rebacking job. The covers were already falling off, so I removed them, cleaning and lined the spine, repaired some sewing and then constructed a spine piece from linen lined Morike.
Strike was finished a little differently. This book had decorative endpapers that I did not want to disturb, and the covers were firmly attached. I still cleaned and lined the spine for support, and made a new Morike spine piece, but instead of breaking the joint, I lifted the cloth and brought the new material on to the boards.
Finally, I reattached the spine pieces and did some basic Japanese tissue repair to the covers on both. These are the finished books.

Wooden Boards Recase

I would typically not take the time to post about a recasing job, but this one was unique in the sense the original covers were wooden boards attached by a leather spine and covered with decorative paper. (This is the first time I have encountered wooden boards).

The book qualified for recasing because the sewing was broken and the text block was detached from the spine, in several small groups. I removed the loose signatures from the book, and removed the original endpapers (which were already delaminating) by spraying them with a 50/50 water/alcohol mix to loosen the remaining adhesive. Next, I pulled the text block and placed the folios between Reemay for washing and deacidification. While thumbing through the text block, I found a small ink drawing. I tested in the inks, and they were water soluble. So I set the image aside and later brushed the back with Wei T'O to deacidify it. This is the drawing.

 The text block required a full treatment because it was originally stab sewn. After washing and deacidifying, I went through and guarded all the sections with Japanese tissue. (The top image shows the text block being guarded and dried between Reemay lined boards. The bottom shows the text book after guarding and collating pages).

Next, I sewed the text block back together, adding new dove gray endpapers, cased it in, and made a label. Then I began to work with the original covers. I made a fake text block from corrugated board to support the covers, and wrapped it in polyester film (mylar) so it could be handled without further damage. Finally, I constructed a phase box to house these items together.

Wet Cleaning and Report

I was going through my old pictures and realized I had not yet posted any wet cleaning of books. Since this particular book belongs to me, I wrote a treatment report for it. I will post that with pictures instead of the usual format.

Treatment Report

Title: Alice in Wonderland – Carroll        Date Completed: August 2009
Format: Book
Material: Cloth                                     Time:  28 hours
Binding: Full

Condition: Text block was originally perfect bound, but the adhesive had delaminated in spots, causing the text block to be split into several “sections.” The text block was completely detached from the front cover. Pages were yellow with acid and incredibly brittle. Almost every page was torn or creased, with pieces missing. A few pages were missing entirely. Covers were in surprisingly good condition, with the exception of a piece missing from the spine. There were a few cracks in the cloth, but the spine was still attached, joints were not too worn and corners were not bumped.

Treatment: Pages were separated from text block on by one and placed between sheets of Reemay. Once all the pages were separated, they were soaked in cold, filtered water for 20 minutes. The initial pH of the paper was 3.5, so after a water bath, the pages were soaked in Magnesium Bicarbonate [Mg(HCO3)2] for an additional 30 minutes. The pages, attached to the Reemay, were then hung to remove excess liquid, pressed between blotting paper, and dried on the drying rack. The pH after washing was 6.5. Once dried, all pages were aligned and inspected for damage. Missing pages were replaced with acid-free Dove Grey paper and repairs were made with heat-set tissue. The pages were then divided into signatures of six and guarded with Japanese tissue (via wheat starch paste). When all sections were attached (sewn one on) and aligned, they were nipped in the press to reduce swell. Using pre-punched holes, the text block was sewn with tapes. A toned, linen lined, handmade paper endsheet was sewn in to replace the missing endpapers in the front. The spine was then lined with Japanese tissue (via wheat starch paste), head and tail bands were attached, and then the spine was lined with linen (via PVA) and rounded. The endsheets were lifted on the covers, and the original spine lining was removed, and then replaced with Japanese tissue and 10 pt board. The text block was re-attached to the boards by gluing the tapes and linen down under the lifted endsheets. The missing piece on the spine was replaced with Morike and toned with acrylics. The small cracks in the cover were repaired with Japanese tear strips, and also toned.

Notes:  Despite de-acidification, the pages remained terribly brittle. Some pages tore slightly during sewing, and it reached the point where continued repair with heat-set tissue was not worth the value of the book. Had this been a more prestigious book, the pages might have been individually lined with a very thin Japanese tissue for support. But this particular book was not worth such efforts.

Images:

These images show the book before treatment. Notice the breaks in the text block.

This is a pictures show the washing process, including the initial submerge in the bath (top), the amount of acid washed out with soaking (below), and a method of hanging the leaves to dry (bottom).

These are after images. I received a lot of brownie points for getting the text block back in the case without rebacking it. I was just lucky, considering I had to guard every folio for sewing.

Wet Leather

I came across this book on the end processing cart at S.U. (For those who don't know, the end processing cart is books for special collections which come to the lab for book plates or repair before becoming available to the public). Leather can be wet during the binding process. In fact, you want it to be so that it is flexible and will  stretch tight on the book. After it has been bound and on the shelf for a while, this is what happens when water is introduced. (The white you see is a Japanese tear strip for a hinge repair).