That tip about not trimming endpapers until after glue-up was dead wrong for me

I had a guy at the craft store tell me to always trim endpapers after the glue dries. I tried it on 3 books and every single one had a mess on the edges where the glue squeezed out and stuck to my bone folder. Went back to trimming them before glue-up like I used to do and my last 2 books came out clean. Anyone else have bad luck with that method?

3 comments

3 Comments

kimr914d agoMost Upvoted

@joseph_green13 did you use coated or uncoated paper for those smooth peels?

iris_thomas854d ago

Ugh, I had the exact same disaster. Someone told me that trick and I ended up peeling half the endpaper off trying to unstick my folder from the wet glue. Feels like a trap for beginners, honestly.

joseph_green134d ago

Wait, am I the only one who actually had that tip work for me? I feel like @iris_thomas85 maybe had a different kind of glue or something, because when I tried it with regular PVA it just peeled right off. The trick is you gotta wait until the glue is tacky but not wet, like maybe 30 seconds after you brush it on. If you clamp down while it's still soaking the endpaper, yeah you're definitely gonna tear it. I've done this on like 20 books now and never had an issue once I got the timing down. Maybe give it another shot with a scrap piece of paper first to test the glue consistency?