That no-paste hinge method I thought was crazy actually works great

I saw someone on here talking about using a paring knife to shave hinge joints instead of paste, and I figured it was just lazy work. But after ruining 3 boards last month with too much moisture from paste, I gave it a shot on a cheap text block. The knife trick gives me way more control, and the joint moves smoother without any gunk. Has anyone else switched from paste to dry hinging for certain projects?

3 comments

3 Comments

lucas_perez21d ago

Yo seriously that's actually a genius point nobody's bringing up. The real win with dry hinging is you can swap out the joint if you mess up, whereas paste locks everything in forever. I've got this old german text block where the spine paper was toast, and dry hinging let me test like 4 different paper weights before committing. Plus you avoid that shrinkage problem when paste dries and pulls the boards out of alignment. It's not for everything, but for delicate stuff or when you're still figuring out the structure, it's a lifesaver.

zara_hill4621d ago

Right? Same here, I messed up a joint on a super fragile manuscript and just swapped it out no sweat.

joelp8121d ago

WAIT hold on. @lucas_perez you said you tested 4 different paper weights? That's nuts, I didn't even think about that being a possibility. I've got a beat up german book too and the spine paper feels like tissue, I was gonna just paste something thick on there and pray. But you're telling me I can just swap out paper like samples until I get it right without ruining anything? That changes everything for me honestly. @zara_hill46 was talking about swapping out joints too which I thought was just for mistakes but now I see the bigger picture. I'm definitely trying this dry method on my next fragile project before I wreck another board with my impatience.