What s New in Hardcover Binding

Transcription

1 Formerly The New Library Scene VOLUME 3 ISSUE 4 A NEWSLETTER FROM HBI AND THE LIBRARY BINDING INSTITUTE What s New in Hardcover Binding Members of HBI and the Library Binding Institute were asked to submit information and/or photos about What s New in Hardcover Binding. Following are responses received from four association members: LBS Innovations in Hardcover Binding by Fritz James Over the past five years, the model used to produce books has changed. There are now shorter runs and bindings on-demand. New machinery has been developed for the shorter-run market and existing equipment has been modified to respond to lower quantities. The model for book production has changed from long runs of 25,000 to 50,000 books to an average production of 500 to 1,000 books. Manufacturers of bookbinding equipment recognized the opportunity and now produce equipment for this bind-on-demand/ short-run market. Much of the equipment represents stand-alone pieces that are not linked together. This results in some limitations, but the equipment is constantly evolving and more fully automated equipment will be developed. Some binderies were applying a blank piece of paper in the cover feeder of a perfect binder to guard the adhesive and then were stripping off the paper on both sides of the book. The book block then moved on to the next steps for converting to a hardbound book. Current perfect binders that use hot melt or PUR can produce great paperback books. To produce a hardbound book, bookbinders would run a paper cover in the cover feeder to cover the adhesive and then later We saw the opportunity for a new approach and as a result, developed a new endsheet that can run successfully in the cover feeder of most perfect binders. The adhesive can be PVA, hot melt, or PUR. The endsheet design uses two folded sheets combined with a reinforcing fabric. When the combined endpaper is applied in the cover feed, it not only applies the reinforced endpaper but also applies the spine liner at the same time. remove the two outer excess endpapers. To solve this problem, we developed an endsheet that is combined WINTER

2 What s New in Hardcover Binding (continued from page 1) with a spine lining reinforcing material that can be applied in the cover feed station. With this combined endpaper, the perfect binder can now produce a book block with endpapers and a spine reinforcement that is ready to proceed as a hardcover book. nological advances. We ve worked for years making equipment safer, more versatile and reliable. Now in this economic climate we have innovated another necessity for the binding industry more production with less workforce! The LBS combined endpaper can be made with a wide variety of reinforcing materials. Most are made with cotton cambric, but we can also use cotton stretch, nylon stretch, or specification drill. The newest style of the combined endsheet is the textbook version. It is a universal endsheet with a spine reinforcement of drill. A flysheet is bound in with the book block. After the book block is prepared with a perfect binder, the book can be side sewn to insure the heavy text block will stay together. In just one operation you apply the universal drill reinforced endpaper and spine liner. Not only does the combined endpaper save several operations it produces a better book. LBS is glad to provide samples for you to see how this technology can help you reduce costs and produce great bindings. Mekatronics, Inc. ULTRABIND 2 from Mekatronics Inc. Information provided by Jack Bendror With over fifty years of innovation under its belt you would think Mekatronics would rest on its laurels. No way, as always we are ready to embrace the latest tech- The new optimized ULTRABIND 2 not only eliminates four salaries and increases throughput, it also has the ability to process the entire job with only two unskilled workers. It eliminates off-line sorting, milling, notching and hand double-fan binding. That means no operator judgment, no risk of damage to the book, perfect quality every time, higher/predictable throughput regardless of book size. Bottom line lower costs per book produced. The ULTRABIND 2 has zero off-line hand operations thereby boosting quality and it has the ability to process the entire job from a thin, one page book, to a thick, 3-1/2 book. This revolutionary machine slashes unit costs by at least 50%! By creating this single stream of production higher profits can become a reality. Consider the benefits of the new design and you ll know that they justify the investment. Muller Martini The Diamant MC Bookline Information provided by Jim Kaeli Now bookbinders don t have to compromise book quality for fast production or vice versa. The newgeneration Diamant MC Bookline gives you both. Featuring Motion Control Technology, the fully automated Diamant s data input and machine set-up are user-friendly and fast, and integrated drives enable quick changeovers and precise adjustment of processes during production. 2

3 What s New in Hardcover Binding (continued from page 2) Muller Martini Diamant MC Bookline As print runs get smaller and smaller, turnaround times get shorter and shorter. The Diamant provides book quality, shortest changeover times, intuitive operation, and efficient hardcover production, enabling book manufacturers to remain competitive while enhancing profit potential despite reduced runs. Wisdom Adhesives WizBind Product Line for On-Demand Bookbinding Information provided by Tom Rolando On demand printing and bookbinding has seen rapid growth with the recent advent of technological advances in printing and binding. As the longest running and Top-Mid Sized Adhesive Organization in North America, Wisdom Adhesives has been at the forefront of quick-turnaround on demand bookbinding with the development of waterbased, hot melt and protein adhesive products to match binder s needs and original equipment specifications. Wisdom Adhesives has adhesive products for case-making (both waterbased and protein adhesive based), casing-in (mainly waterbased) and hot melt for spine adhesive binding. Product lines range from highly formulated for specific adhesion and application to economical for easier to bind surfaces. Additionally, Wisdom Adhesives has developed products with excellent adhesion properties for photographic applications. Below is a summary of Wisdom Adhesives WizBind Product Line for On-Demand Bookbinding. Product Type Application Comments R149H Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Casing-In General Purpose Produce R135 Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Casing-In Casing-In Product R205AS R134 High Viscosity Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Waterbased Copolymer- Homopolymer Blend Casing-In Casing-In High Viscosity Work-Horse Casing-In with Adhesion Promoter Economical Casing-In Product R172MB Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Casing-In Added Adhesion Promoter for Additional Bonding Properties R72LE Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Casing-In Fast Setting and Often Low Warp Adhesive Product W3307 Highly Forumlated Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Casing-In, Photographic Specialty Product for Very Difficult to Adhere to Surfaces R92ET Waterbased Copolymer Adhesive Casemaking General Purpose Product 2010B Protein Adhesive Casemaking Go to General Purpose Adhesive Product 700H Protein Adhesive Casemaking High Solids General Purpose Protein Adhesive Product 8756S Protein Adhesive Casemaking Specialty Protein Adhesive for Difficult Surfaces WIS-H16 Hot Melt Adhesive Binding High Performance Hot Melt Adhesive for Binding 3

4 How Green are Books and Bindings? By Werner Rebsamen One of the questions we often get is What will happen to the books when their lifecycle ends? It is a good question because it involves mega-millions of books and materials like paper, boards, adhesives, covering materials and more. This question leads to many others How well do certain materials recycle? Which ones must go to into the incinerator or to a landfill? One woman, very concerned about children s books, wanted to know if there were poisonous ingredients in binding materials. With the exception of a recent news story which reported that a lead content had been found in a printer s ink on children s books which were manufactured in Asia, this writer is not aware of any such problems. No publisher would be foolish enough to allow unsafe books to get into the markets. In the fall issue of ShelfLife,, Bill Upton of Malloy, Inc. wrote about cover paper and the book industry. His excellent article and contribution convinced us that there is no such thing as a dead tree version. Instead, despite all the paper being used, more trees are growing than ever before. Of all the books being produced, they represent only a small segment of the paper industry. While this article concentrates on aspects of recycling used books, librarians have contacted LBI looking for more specific information. They are justified in their question, How do laminated, coated and other book covering materials recycle? After all, we live in a new, environmentally conscious world. Our younger generations have different questions than those we had the pleasure to address during library binding and preservation workshops a couple decades ago. The emphasis at that time was mainly on preservation and maintenance of a collection. Let s hope this particular question was not being asked to determine how to get rid of the books in a library and replace them with the electronic media! Well, I m just kidding, but the fact is that books are consumable items. We purchase or receive them, enjoy the contents, and sooner or later, we must dispose of at least some of them in a responsible way. Library binders and conservators have the skills and tools to prolong the life of valuable, printed materials; but what will happen to all the other printed materials, especially books, which must be discarded? Book Blocks - Recycling the Paper Recycling paper is the easy part. It is almost fashionable today to have the copyright pages imprinted with inscriptions like 100% recycled or 100% postconsumer waste. One might think that publishers save money by using recycled papers, but they actually pay approximately nine percent more for them. While more expensive, they use these papers out of concern for the environment. A great example is publishing executive Tana Myers of the New World Library, who takes pride in creating an earth-friendly book. On a 150,000 copy run, her company saves 953 fully grown trees, 400,000 gallons of water, and 617 BTUs of energy. Furthermore, they avoid the production of more than 47,000 pounds of solid waste and 92,000 pounds of greenhouse gases this all according to estimates given by a San Francisco based recycling vendor. (BT-Magazine Nov./Dec. 2003) These days, most publishers opt for 30 or more percent of recycled papers. It is a popular, fashionable trend, and shows that publishers support Green Book endeavors. Unlike the early days of paper recycling where getting the ink out of the paper was a big and expensive task, no one even talks about these issues today. In fact, it is not uncommon for papers to be recycled many times over. For bookbinders, this trend has caused us many headaches and problems, especially with perfect binding and trimming. Virgin papers have long fibers. When we recycle these paper fibers, they get shorter and shorter until they turn into an almost dust-like substance. No problem. The paper 4

5 How Green are Books and Bindings (continued from page 4) Picture taken at a disposal area in Germany. This box is designated for paper waste. Looks like someone got rid of a home library. How well do these books recycle? mills load that paper with all sorts of fillers. All they are interested in is the print-ability of the paper surfaces. Now try to bond such a short fiber/filler substance on its very edge with an adhesive there is simply nothing to hold on anymore. Machinery and tool suppliers have, with limited success, come up with all kinds of spine preparation tools to cope with such fiber-less papers. This is one more reason to insist on the double fan adhesive binding process when binding books designated for a library. As you are well aware from our previous articles on adhesive bindings, library binders apply a small amount of adhesive to each side of the sheet, a process much different from commercial perfect binding. Best of all, it results into a superior binding for virtually any type of paper. Book Covers - Paper Boards Paper boards, in all the different qualities, are made from recycled paper waste and like the paper itself, are a good candidate to go through the same process over and over again. Paper board companies take pride in their efforts to Go Green and use that factor in their advertisements. Recycling - We re part of the Solution. A 1989 ad by the former Davey Company, which produced binders boards, stated We recycle 200 million pounds of waste paper every year and put it into a useful product Book Covers. While 200 million pounds is a lot, this was done by a relatively small paper board manufacturer. Kudos to our paper board industry. They have always been in the forefront of being environmentally conscientious and promoted recycling of paper-waste into useful products like packaging and specifically for our industry, into book cover boards. For binding hardcover books, the paper board industry offers many different kinds of book cover boards. They come in various structures, thicknesses and qualities, and their dimensional stability is, perhaps, the most important factor. But as with the paper industry, paper board suppliers will tell you how the manufacturing of their products is affected by recycling papers. As stated earlier, papers are recycled many times over and are loaded with fillers. Those fillers cost less than paper fibers, but they create all kinds of problems for our industry. Those problems start with the manufacture of paper boards. The large sheets need to be cut and the filler materials (usually clay) play havoc with the knives. Worse, the dust and small particles created are substantial. Every stack of paper boards now must be brushed and vacuumed to remove those particles. When case-making and using delicate, smooth covering materials, the last thing you want to see underneath a smooth surface are little bumps. As you can see, although the paper board industry has always been a leader in recycling, they too are hit with extra costs very much beyond their control. Book Cover Cloth Quality books and bindings still most often feature 5

6 How Green are Books and Bindings (continued from page 5) cloth covers. Our book-testing laboratory evaluates problematic bindings of books that are manufactured in many different parts of the world and sent to the attention of this writer mainly by publishers. Amazing, and what a pleasure to see how many of these quality books feature cloth covers, mainly a natural finish. In earlier times, when hardcover books were bound almost exclusively into 100 percent cotton cloth covers, recycling those books and bindings was no problem. In an effort to prove a point, and as part of a student s independent study project, we placed some cloth into our vegetable yard to keep the weeds out. In the fall, the cloth had completely deteriorated, broken down and could be tilled under like any other natural, earth-friendly product. However, when I consulted with experts in the trade, they recommended that when cloth book covers are being recycled, they should be separated from the boards and treated in a special manner. Separation is easily done, as virtually all edition book covers are made using animal or protein glues. This all natural adhesive easily does dissolve in water. When recycling books, we must also consider adhesives, laminated materials, ink and other material. Type I is a natural, cellulose kraft paper and, in its natural form is easily recycled. However, if this substrate is being coated or laminated it falls into the category as discussed in the next section of this article. Newer cloth may no longer be all cotton. Some now contain polyester, which of course will not break down. Such separated materials need to go into an incinerator or a landfill. Book Covers Non-Woven Papers and Synthetics In our industry, there are basically three different types of covering substrates: Type I is a paper, a natural fiber web (least expensive, lowest quality). It does not qualify for the use of school books and many other books. Type II is a special paper, a polymer or resin reinforced cellulose fiber web. It meets NASTA School Book Specifications. Type III is a synthetic-fiber, man made material (Example: Tyvek). It meets NASTA School Book Specifications Type II is a paper that is either coated or saturated with a polymer or resin. It no longer will break down and must either go to an incinerator or a landfill. Type III is self-explanatory, as synthetic fibers do not break down. Please note that in all cases, the paper boards are separated from the covering materials and are recycled. Book Covers Laminated Materials These days, the most commonly used book covering materials, including soft covers and book jackets are laminated. That might lead to the question, Do these laminating films break down? The answer is it all depends, as there are different laminating materials. 6

7 How Green are Books and Bindings (continued from page 6) OPP (polypropylene) and the polyethelyne adhesive which goes on it are, according to the experts at D&K, a major laminating foil and machinery supplier, both easily recyclable. Polyester (PET) is a little tougher. By itself, the PET film is recyclable; and again by itself, the adhesive used is also recyclable. However, once the two are combined, recycling becomes more difficult, as the two products are from two different chemical families and exhibit different physical characteristics. Experts on the subject have reported that there maybe companies who could separate such materials, but there needs to be a balance between recycling technology, economics and the environmental impact. At least for the time being, with regard to polyester films, we have little choice but to use either landfills or an incinerating process. However, as I understand it, the paper fibers on such laminated products can be washed off and recycled. Book Covers UV Coated, Printed Materials This used to be a hot topic when we discussed environmental impact of such printed and coated materials. Two decades ago, I attended a seminar at FOGRA in Munich, Germany. More than 400 graphic arts experts participated in this two day workshop. The impact of radiation curing of inks and varnishes were a hot topic at that time. Some German extremists even boycotted certain beers because, they said, the labels on the bottles could not be recycled. (Can you imagine Germans boycotting beer?) These days, that topic is no longer being discussed. Such coated materials can be, according the manufacturers of such machinery, de-inked and recycled with all other printed materials. Manufacturers have also stated that papers with radiation-cured solvent-free inks and lacquers cause fewer problems than water-based systems or papers printed using laser or copy toners. UV-cured coatings break away from the paper in larger pieces and are easily discarded. Adhesives Used in Bookbinding Oh those good old days. When we used only paste and animal (protein) glues, recycling was never a problem. This knowledge is a great advantage when we restore old bindings. We know the glues will dissolve in water and we can easily remove an old cover-material from the cover boards. Animal (Protein) glues and Starches = easily recycle, dissolve in water. PVA (Poly Vinyl Acetate) adhesives are diluted with water. However, once they dry that is if we remove the water the adhesive is converted into a solid, tough film. The good news is that most materials used in book manufacturing recycle well. For example, this laminated covering material washed easily off the paper boards. The actual paper is then removed as well from the laminating foil, leaving very little to go to the incinerator or landfill. Can they be recycled? Opinions vary. Some adhesive chemists say yes for homopolymers and no to internally plasticized, copolymer PVA adhesives. 7

8 Hotmelts are a wax substance that will only break down with excessive heat but is better separated and disposed. For example, when we trimmed books bound with hotmelt, the contaminated paper waste always has to be separated from all others. There are exceptions, like newer, repulpable hotmelts. Those hotmelt particles do not dissolve in water, but become an integral part of the paper during repulping. PUR (Poly Urethane Reactive Hotmelt) will not break down but is said to easily wash away from the paper pulp. The adhesive then can be disposed in a responsible manner. There are, of course, many other adhesives. Take for example pressure sensitive, fugitive and remoistenable glues. An adhesive chemist and expert could easily write an entire article just on that subject. The U.S. EPA Department estimates that 75 percent of our general waste is recyclable. I m sure you will agree that our industry is doing much better in this regard, being very close to 100 percent. Books, covering materials and adhesives are, in most cases, and as stated in regards to the environment, a very friendly product. This is just one more reason to purchase a book for yourself, or as a gift for others who are equally concerned about recycling. Werner Rebsamen is Professor Emeritus at the Rochester Institute of Technology and the technical consultant to HBI and the Library Binding Institute. He can be reached at wtrebs@metrocast.net. HBI and the Library Binding Institute (LBI), publisher of ShelfLife, reserves the right to refuse copy which is not in accordance with HBI/LBI s established policies. Specifically, HBI/LBI endorses no machinery, equipment, material or supply or supplier thereof; other than the ANSI/NISO/LBI Z Library Binding Standard, HBI/LBI endorses no method of binding. Copyright 2007 by HBI and the Library Binding Institute. Subscriptions to ShelfLife are available through most subscription agencies or you may write directly to HBI/LBI, 4440 PGA Boulevard, Suite 600, Palm Beach Gardens, FL ShelfLife is published quarterly in Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. Annual subscription rates are $29.00 for domestic subscribers, $31.00 for Canadian subscribers, and $36.00 for international subscribers. Subscribers must submit a missing issue claim within 90 days from each specific issue s date of publication. If these terms are not adhered to, the publisher will be unable to fill the request. All manuscripts are welcomed for publication review. ShelfLife is indexed in Library Literature and Information Science Abstracts, ISSN CORRECTION In the fall issue of ShelfLife, this photo was included with the incorrect caption. The correct caption is: The unique Meka-A-Case is capable to adjust fully automatically to any given dimension. After application of a cold-emulsion adhesive, the boards and spine inlay are mounted into the exact positions. As shown, the corners and edges are now ready to be turned-in. This edition of ShelfLife compliments of Bound to Stay Bound Books. 8