ASO MILL Blog

Leather book cover 古い本の修理

古い本が大好きです！古い雰囲気の本も好きだけど、本物の革じゃないからダメになりますね。

A little winter project this year was to re-cover and repair a gigantic olde-world-style book.



▲ この素敵な本を15年ほど前から持ったけど、偽物革がダメになったんです。ということは今回のプロジェクトは本の修理です！カバーを外して、本革で新しいカバーを作ります。まったく経験はゼロですが、YouTubeのビデオを見ながら修理できるかなぁ？

I've had this book for about 15 years (it's a collector's edition of a wargames rulebook), but unfortunately the fake leather used for the covers has aged badly, to the extent that it crumbles off in your fingers when you pick it up.

So I decided to try re-covering it in real leather, bought from the craft section of a local DIY store. A big piece of leather cost 2200 yen, and that's about my only expense for this project, other than time. Right, time to watch some how-to videos on YouTube, as I've never done this before!

▲ まずはカバーを切って外しました。

First job was to carefully cut off the old covers and spine.

▲ 古いカバーのボードも新しく作らないといけないので同じ大きさを図りました。

The old cover was firmly attach to the thick boards, so I had to recreate those too.

▲ 100円ショップで買ったスケッチ用のパッドの裏面ボードを使いました。結構厚いボードですので十分固いと思います。

I found some thick card on the back of big sketchpads from the 100 yen shop, and cut that to the same size as the old versions.

▲ 今回、本の背表紙に文字を入れたいです。３Dプリンターで幅2～3ミリの文字をプリントして、そしてネガティブ文字も作りました。ネガティブ文字は強く押す用のプレートになりますが文字の周りに2ミリほど隙間が必要です。この2ミリ隙間は革の厚みで決まっています。

I also wanted to include some extra decorative touches for this book, in the form of embossed letters along the spine. So I turned once again to my trusty 3D printer, and printed some thin letters on a thin (0.2mm!) backing card. I also printed the negative shapes for those letters, with an extra 2mm of space around each letter to allow for the thickness of the leather. This negative would act as a stamp press to better define the letters.

▲ 文字と四角に木材ボンドをブラッシュしました。

Right time to emboss the leather. I brushed wood glue into all the nooks and crevices of the letter plate, before placing that underneath the leather (on the reverse side).

▲ そして、ボンドを付けた文字を革の裏面に張って、正面にネガティブのプレートを置きます。

The negative shape is then placed on the opposite side of the leather, directly above the letters gluing underneath.

▲ その後、24時間ほどクランプと木材で固く押しました。

Then it's simply a matter of pressing the negative shape down hard onto the surface of the leather, clamping it in place for 24 hours or so and leaving the glue to dry.

▲ クランプを外した時にこんな感じになったんです。なんか嬉しい！

It was quite exciting the next morning to unclamp the leather and remove the negative shape.... to find these embossed letters!! That worked beautifully! Thank you, YouTube!

▲ 次はカバーと裏面用のボードも木材ボンドで張りました。ボードの周りに3センチほど余った皮で切りました。

Okay, now we move onto gluing the large front and back boards onto the underside of the leather. These were clamped down and left to dry. A 3cm border of leather was left around each board, and cut at 45 degrees for the corners (2mm away from the board corners, to account for the thickness of the leather).

▲ その3センチの余った皮に木材ボンドを付けて、ボードに曲がりました。これもひとつづつで強く押しました。

Next I carefully folded each side of the 3cm leather borders over, and glued them onto the underside one by one. Clamps and strong pressure are also useful for this step!

▲ 4つのサイドも同じように曲がった後、こんな感じでした。

With all four sides folded over and glued down, my cover looked like this.

▲ あとちょっとです！100ショップで買った黒い用紙を内側に張りました。

I used 2 large sheets of black paper glued down on the inside of each cover side, to hide the joins a little.

▲ 本の背表紙は最後に木材ボンドとクランプで強く押しました。

The spine of the boox pages was liberally brushed with wood glue and clamped down against the spine cover for 24 hours. Not a fast process, this!

▲ カバーの内側と本の背表紙に隙間が空いていましたので、こっちにも黒い用紙を張りました。

I used another couple of strips of black paper to hide the gaps between the covers and inside covers.

▲ あとは飾りだけでした。古いカバーから外されたレジン性飾りを新しいカバーに付けました。これも木材ボンドで付けた。

With the new cover now glued in place, it was time to prettify the book! I carefully reassembled this gorgeous resin hammer motif which came from the original cover, and glued it in place with more wood glue and clamps.

▲ 最後に、Alibabaから注文した真鍮コーナーパーツを付けました。これで完成！

The last step was to add these brass corner protectors, which I found on AliExpress for a couple of dollars (for a pack of 10!). A great match for the brass-effect hammer on the front.

▲ どうですか？文字と真鍮パーツも好きし、革の匂いも素敵です！

All finished!  I'm pretty proud of how well that turned out - it really looks like a quality book. Smells great too!

▲　大成功だ！やった。

Onto the next project.....

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