Lumbeck Binding

Emil Lumbeck was a German bookbinder that created not only the Double Fan method but created some of the first modern PVA for use in bookbinding.  A student where I work has a book that was comb bound and he asked if I could bind it into a proper hardcover book.  Since the pages are single sheets the only option is to do the Lumbeck binding method.

Preparing the Book Block

The last three months have been some of the wettest in recent history and I found out that the garage that I set up my workbench in leaks pretty badly so I'm forced to use my kitchen to do my binding. It isn't ideal as I don't have the space that I'm used to. I also lost some tools and supplies to the damp.

This book is thick (29 mm), and it was a real hassle to get it squared up. Every time I knocked it up on head, then the spine would slip and visa versa. I finally knocked it up as well as I could and took a set of squares to make final adjustments.

Time is of the essence when working with EVA so I did my best to coat both sides while fanning the pages before pressing the spine together with my fingers and wiping any excess adhesive away. Now I don't own a Lumbeck Press, nor do I have a nice finishing press on stands so I took my second finishing press, the one that came with my plough, and used two backing boards to press the spine together. I have waste sheets in place to protect my boards from adhesive. I'm sure I will eventually get the hang of this eventually but right now sewn signatures are less of a hassle to deal with.

I left it in the press for several hours as I had something else to take care of, however I think an hour would have sufficed. On the advice of Nassar Mihoubi I used the comb bind holes and sewed it together a bit like a stab binding. This should keep some of the stress off of the spine.  

Bookmark and Endbands placed on

Mull added to reinforce the spine.

Cutting the boards

using 2 mm greyboard

The gauge in the middle is the width of the spine piece and the hinge joints

Making the Case

The Colorado Coluille that I bought from Ratchford Limited is very nice book cloth but I found applying the adhesive directly to the cloth caused for some unusual stretching.

Despite the book boards being the correct dimensions I managed to make a mistake on the hinge joint. I'm hoping this case will find a use in the future as it is completely unusable for this project. Frustrated I took some time off from finishing this book. This is why I've named my blog Misadventures in Bookbinding. I do make a lot of mistakes, especially after being away from it for 15 months.

Making the Case...again

I was still frustrated with this book so I went to Facebook and asked for advice on I am a Bookbinder! and Learn Bookbinding I was able to get some advice such as I needed to make the joints go below the 'stab' binding of the comb binding punch holes. I also took advice from Mark Cockram of Cockram Books who was kind enough to do a live stream video on hinge joints and flat back binds.  I suggest checking out his Facebook Page as it has very useful videos.

So following Mark Cockram's advice I made two gauges for the hinge joints instead of one solid piece and then eyeballing the spine piece in as I've always have done. I also used a strip of paper as suggested by Das Bookbinding for his Flat Back Bradel Bind.  I've never tried this before but it was nice to be able to dry fit the book before putting the book cloth on.  This worked out well as the paper had stretched a bit and I had to do it again (using less adhesive this time). This worked much better and I was ready to apply the book cloth. 

This time I placed the adhesive on the boards and not directly on the Colorado Coluille book cloth with better results. Casing it in was dead simple, this is something I used to find really stressful and I thought I was going to have some issues as it has been so long but it went swimmingly. I put in some plastic sheets under each cover and gave it a good couple of hours in my nipping press.

Some small errors in the book. The paper used to hold the book boards and spine piece in stretched slightly when the adhesive went on, so the fore edge is off on the head by about 0.75 mm just enough to be noticed under close scrutiny. However as my first book in 15 months, and a bind that I've not tried before I'm pretty pleased with the end results.

Check out the video from DAS Bookbinding on doing a flat back Lumbeck bind.