Bookbinding Presses

As previously noted, one of the bonuses of taking up bookbinding is that many of the tools/equipment can be though of as woodworking projects. Some are pretty simple, like the sewing stands and awl punching cradles. Others can take on a more complex design. The bookbinding press became complicated because I wanted to be able to generate as much pressure as possible with the materials and equipment available for me to work with. An all wood design might have been prettier, but the pressure generating components would have to be too bulky for the device to be both attractive and effective. 

The Craft of Bookbinding/M.Bannister showed a design that utilized wood materials along with steel piping and fixtures which I used as the starting point for my design. 

The most challenging part of the design would be anchoring the pipes to generate pressure without having to use floor mounts as that would take away working space from the plates. The wood blocks need to be flat, stable and strong. Thus Bannister recommended  either plywood glued together or maple to a 1.75 inch thickness. Crosscut in Portland the best selection in my area and will at times have remnants at really good prices.  I lucked out at an oak countertop that would provide sufficient material two presses. 

Why two presses? Well, I was using inkjet paper in rolls for my book sheets and was having a hard time keeping the sheets flat once cut into in this project 10 x 20 inch sheets. For future projects I wanted the option of using 12 x 24 inch sheets. Thus the dimensions for the larger press. The smaller one could be of sufficient size to accommodate a 12 x 12 inch book, which at this point, is the largest book I can see myself making. 

I spent some time at Home Depot playing with the fittings and came up with a combination that would serve my purposes.

The breadboard end design was both for looks and to help against warping, although countertop hardwood panels are of quarter sawn and glue-lam construction for the required dimensional stability in kitchen countertop use.

At the time I started this, it seemed like a weekend or two project. In reality though just by surface area and linear feet of bread-boarding, the wood block area amounted to a small table or workbench. The initial design called for holes for the pipes to as snug in diameter to provide a guide for the top panel to stay true to the base while being able to slide up and down freely. But- the pipe hardware is made to looser tolerances so holes had to be widened and the pipe assembly secured in a parallel and perpendicular manner.

Some improvising was needed to support the large and heavy sandwich boards to they could be kept aligned while drilling the holes.

Then for the jig to be held in at times an awkward manner to allow for marking and adjustment for the device to work as intended

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Finally, I needed to take the fittings that hold the pipes on the underside to my friendly metal worker to cut off ¼ inch to keep from extruding below the underside of the base.

Note that the support for the screws on the larger vise have reinforcements on the side. This was to address an error in grain orientation- the pressure of the screw was directed parallel rather than perpendicular to the grain. Rather than start all over, I capped the sides with purpleheart glued to to endgrain and reinforced with long screw crossing underneath the pipes. The mechanism thereafter able to withstand as much torque as I can apply to the screw handles. The finished product, while not as ornamental as an antique all metal vise, is just as effective. In the case of the larger vise, it has much more work surface than the great majority of vises available. The cost of materials is a fraction of what two large metal vises go for. And time spent on construction, assembly and finish- well, that entertainment.