Newbs Investigation through Experimentation regarding Conservation

[W16227]

That's great info! I had three stylin' aquariums going a couple of years ago, and I just recently sold off everything for pennies on the dollar a few months back

 

 

thats the way it works usually,

 

after reading your thread - I revisited a lot of the leafcasting videos - the plumbing of it all reminded me a lot of what you do for an aquarium.

 

Even though you could probably get a real cheap shop vac -the real aquarium pumps are designed to have a valve after the outlet - so you can tune in the flow.

 

Have an overflow at the top of the working tank - drains back into the holding tank ( so the top level of the water when running everything is set to a constant level). You can control the agitation with the pump and valve - but still retain a constant working water level height.

 

Shut the pump off - and the working tank drains back into the holding tank. With the open pumps (the ones that sit underwater and suck in water instead of a plumbed line inlet) - I am pretty sure they will allow for draining once you shut them off. If more control is needed on the drain side - you just have a separate drain line.

 

If there are any local fish stores - you may be able to get a used pump pretty cheap. Go for more power than you think you need - then us a valve to throttle the outlet pressure.

 

 

 

The RO/DI - do not know at all if this is required. For saltwater tanks - they are used to remove as many impurities as possible. They reach is 2 PPM or less PPM dissolved solids - even if the tap is 600 or more (pretty much better than any distilled water you get at the store). Removes chlorine too. Theory for saltwater - is to remove everything and add back in only what you need. Would seem that this would make sense for leafcasting (or other restoration techniques) - so you want as much control of what touches the book as possible. This may not make any real difference - but would be something to test if you build up a simple setup --- well - and know someone with a RO/DI unit ( the real ro/di are not cheap to just use to test something).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[427Impaler]

So here is my final results in conserving the Four Color 148. Keep in mind this is my first attempt at anything like this, it is certainly not a Renoir, probably more of an Etch-a-sketch

 

So for comparison here is the spine prior to any work:

 

So my first attempt was to patch areas on the spine. This was way too conservative of an effort, the spine was HEAVILY worn and so weak that after the patching was done even the lightest of pressing resulted in this pancake:

 

 

So after removing the first conservation experiment, a full spine reinforcement has culminated in this:

 

 

A much more natural spine. Still some work to do with trimming the excess patch paper and a final press. The book is becoming a rock solid reader and has some decent eye appeal, I learned a ton from this and had some fun in the process.

 

Important things learned going forward is to keep the Jap paper off the exterior of the cover, it is fairly transparent but is still quite visible on the face of the book. All repairs should stay on the inside unless there is going to be a color touch or heavy re-glossing to cover up the papers texture.

[427Impaler]

Thought it was time to do a little update here. This time I thought I would take a run at t tricky repair: Removing spine roll on a square bound book.

 

The book is a particularly difficult one to work on, it is a square bound glued spine book that has spent the last 40 years rolled up like a newspaper. In fact it has been rolled for so long the glue has flowed and reset in this impossible angle:

 

 

 

This is going to take some additional care as the bottom of the spine has delaminated:

 

 

This view gives you an idea of just how curled this thing is. It's not a loose curl either, in hand the spine feels rock solid and locked in this position:

 

 

The first step I took was to gently humidify the book for two hours. My hopes were that the moisture would permeate the glue and soften things slightly to allow adjustment. The book did feel a little softer after humidification, but not anywhere near enough to allow unrolling of the spine. Next was gradually heating the spine to try softening the glue, this was done by inserting the spine area into my Seal press under low heat and gradually warming it ten seconds at a time. After a few insertions the spine warmed to the touch and became noticeably softer YAY!

 

Now, very carefully with surgical gloves, I very slowly worked the spine manually back into place. It was much harder that that last sentence might indicate, it was a very careful balance of moving the spine and being ultra cautious to not do more damage to the book. It took four separate heat/manipulation sessions to get the spine close to where it belonged.

 

Here is how things turned out:

 

 

 

I'm happy with the results, I don't think the spine was ever going to look like new, but at least the book lays flatter and looks a little more presentable. Once the book cooled the glue took hold again and tightened up nicely, it feels like a completely different book. It appears there was no additional damage created which was a big concern when man-handling a 64 year old comic book!

 

Total time spent on this not including the humidification was about 90 minutes.