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Moldy book, is it worth trying to save?

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Teni

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Mar 3, 2009, 9:44:38 PM3/3/09
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I have a first edition hard cover of My Friend Flicka. It is the 19th
impression. But my grandmother gave it to me after letting it live
under a leaky fish tank for noone knows how long.

The cover is mildly warped, the pages are dry and rather brittle, and
the cover and some pages have black mold on them. Plus, the binding is
coming apart a bit.

So, I know I could try to salvage it a bit so i can just have it to
have it, so to speak. I don't think it will be, but if i sent it out
for cleaning and repairs, would the increase in value make it worth
the expense?

btw, i don't have the jacket at all.

Francis A. Miniter

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Mar 3, 2009, 11:48:36 PM3/3/09
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A 19th printing is not worth sending out for repair.
However, since it is not a valuable book, I would regard it
as a good opportunity to learn how to cope with books in
distress.

The mould is the first order of priority. I have on
occasion set a book on a table near a south or west facing
window (both is best) upright with the pages fanned out and
let the sun work on it for a number of weeks, changing the
exposed pages every couple of days. This will both dry out
any remaining dampness and also will kill some, if not all,
of the mould. It also gets rid of the smell. How long
should this go on? I have given books this treatment for
two months at times.

Do not spray the book with mould killer. Such a product is
probably highly acidic and that can damage the pulp in the
pages. The damage would not manifest itself immediately,
but over time, by yellowing the pages. If you have a pH
meter or litmus paper, you can check the pH of the product.

The boards probably cannot be unwarped, but if you want to
try, use a book press and leave the book in it for some
months.

As to the binding, there are a couple of book repair sites
on the internet that will show you how to deal with various
binding problems. As to materials for binding repairs, you
want to have pH neutral adhesives and tapes. You can
usually find them at an art supply store. One brand is
Lineco. You can find the Lineco site on line and learn
something about their products.

--
Francis A. Miniter

Oscuramente
libros, laminas, llaves
siguen mi suerte.

Jorge Luis Borges, La Cifra Haiku, 6

Teni

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Mar 4, 2009, 10:04:57 AM3/4/09
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On Mar 3, 11:48 pm, "Francis A. Miniter" <famini...@comcast.net>
wrote:

Thank you for the detailed reply! I really appreciate it. I'm
definitely going to try all that (if we ever get any sunny days...)
Someday, one of these random old books i happen upon is actually gunna
be worth money :-D

LeeAnna

Anders Thulin

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Mar 4, 2009, 10:34:15 AM3/4/09
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Francis A. Miniter wrote:

> The mould is the first order of priority. I have on occasion set a book
> on a table near a south or west facing window (both is best) upright
> with the pages fanned out and let the sun work on it for a number of
> weeks, changing the exposed pages every couple of days. This will both
> dry out any remaining dampness and also will kill some, if not all, of
> the mould. It also gets rid of the smell. How long should this go on?
> I have given books this treatment for two months at times.

But as the object of the exercise presumably is to kill *all* the mold,
not just that part that is visible, how do you verify that you have indeed
succeeded? If you don't, you're just adding a probably mold-carrier to
your other books.

The traditional treatment is with Thymol and a heat lamp in an air-tight box,
but otherwise much the same: fan out leaves, let the Thymol gas work on the book.
But even then, some kind of verification seems to be required before the book
is allowed to be returned to the shelves.

--
Anders Thulin anders*thulin.name http://www.anders.thulin.name/

Francis A. Miniter

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Mar 5, 2009, 3:26:21 PM3/5/09
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Interesting. I was not aware of Thymol. As a result of
your post, I did a little research which led me to this
article in the Abbey Newsletter, a Stanford University
publication devoted to preservation of various media:

http://cool-palimpsest.stanford.edu/byorg/abbey/an/an21/an21-3/an21-308.html

The researchers note that the use of Thymol does result in
the degradation of the paper support, though they do not
know the particular process. They recommend against its
use. As an alternative, they recommend exposure to
sunlight, as I had noted.

Anders Thulin

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Mar 6, 2009, 10:39:37 AM3/6/09
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Francis A. Miniter wrote:

Thanks for the info, and the reference -- the Thymol process was described
in one of Arthur Johnson's books on book restoration, and it stuck in my mind,
mainly because it Thymol was (and probably still is) an ingredient I could
actually buy over the counter.

I would like to have seen some further experiments to rule out any effects
the PVC and polypropylene might have had, even with the only slight heating
present. And there are a bit too many 'appears to' -- one of the most important
are in the abstract which says only that 'thymol appeared to have a deleterious
effect on the paper support, on gum arabic, and on iron gall ink', which
is a rather weaker statement that that it actually had such effect.

Sunlight is an antibiotic -- ultraviolet light has that effect. It also
breaks down cellulose bonds, and so increases paper degradation. Thus, I can
hardly believe that either the author of the paper or you recommend it
without precaution. Through a piece of glass much of the UV light is removed,
and so again the question of actual mechanism is raised: is it the exposure to
sunlight that does the job, or simply that the book is aired and dried out, causing
mold to deactivate, and that a night-time operation with gentle heat applied would
have the same effect?

I think I asked this once, several years ago, but I don't remember an answer.
Perhaps you know?

Francis A. Miniter

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Mar 6, 2009, 12:03:18 PM3/6/09
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As I read the article I thought that a comparative
experiment would be good, Thymol effects vs. solar effects.
In my house I have tinted glass that reduces UV light.
The sunning process seems to kill the mold effectively -
given enough time. As to the mechanism, I have generally
thought that direct heat was an important factor, taking
temperatures beyond the viability zone for mould. But I
have wondered if there is more to it.

bml...@hotmail.com

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Apr 18, 2009, 3:38:02 AM4/18/09
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On Mar 3, 9:48 pm, "Francis A. Miniter" <famini...@comcast.net> wrote:
> Teni wrote:
> > I have a first edition hard cover of My Friend Flicka. ...

>
> > The cover is mildly warped, the pages are dry and rather brittle,
,,<snip>

> As to the binding, there are a couple of book repair sites
> on the internet that will show you how to deal with various
> binding problems.  As to materials for binding repairs, you
> want to have pH neutral adhesives and tapes.  You can
> usually find them at an art supply store.  One brand is
> Lineco.  You can find the Lineco site on line and learn
> something about their products.

I tried my local art supply store looking for archival tape and hinges
to mount a drawing with sentimental value. [Not enough sentiment
for me to have it framed by my preservation/restoration expert
framer, but enough that I was at least going to use archival
materials.] I asked for archival mounting materials and was
shown the selection in a display.

What I found was that they used "museum quality" materials for
the framing done in the back, but none of the tapes or hinges
they sold were archival. When I questioned this, they happily
showed me the archival materials they used and offered to do
the framing. But, they refused to sell me the archival materials.

After I complained that if I did the framing myself they were selling
materials that would ruin my artwork and that I felt this was a
corporate strategy to sell framing services, the manager gave
me a partial tape roll and some hinges from the back workroom.
I offered to buy a whole roll and a full pack and was told that they
are not in the system and they cannot sell them.

This was a big art supplies chain. I'm not giving the name
because this was a few years ago and there is a slight chance
that they have improved.

The important thing is to read the packages carefully to make sure
the materials really are archival - the salespeople may be clueless.
In my case, I believe they were poorly trained, not dishonest or
trained wrong.


Kris Baker

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Apr 19, 2009, 1:41:52 PM4/19/09
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On Apr 18, 2:38 am, bml2...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
(snip)

>
> This was a big art supplies chain.  I'm not giving the name
> because this was a few years ago and there is a slight chance
> that they have improved.
>
> The important thing is to read the packages carefully to make sure
> the materials really are archival - the salespeople may be clueless.
> In my case, I believe they were poorly trained, not dishonest or
> trained wrong.


....or even more likely, they were an independent business
renting space from the store.

Kris

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