Parents and teachers have both experienced the struggle of purchasing books for kids only to see the pages fall out and the spines fall apart.
This may be especially true for books that were yours that you’ve passed down to your kids. Generations of use will surely start to show.
If you’re a teacher, you’ve seen year after year of young students come through and use the same books, with more wear and tear happening as the years go on.
Buying all new books is not only a hassle but also expensive. And sometimes, the feel of a well loved book is kind of nice--as long as it’s still readable!
The book binding repair process can be a really simple and easy process and using the right products from the beginning will help! With this easy guide you can get your books back to functional in no time.
Picking the Right Book Repair Tape
The first step in the book repair process is picking the right kind of book repair tape. There are a few different kinds of tapes you can use, depending on the material of the books you are repairing.
Here's a list of book repair tape:
Cloth Book Tape
If the book's cover is made from a cloth binding material, then using a cloth repair tape will work great.
Chromalabel’s book repair comes in several different colors which makes it easy to match the books you’re fixing up.
Clear Stretchable Book Repair Tape
This tape works great for book covers made from plastic, vinyl, as well as paperback books.
Clear tape will allow the cover of the book to be seen, which is nice for children’s books as they usually have decorative covers.
This tape is also stretchy which makes it very easy to form the tape around corners. If the book’s surface is no longer perfectly flat from various bumps and bruises, the tape will conform around them.
The adhesive is extremely aggressive, so you can count on this tape to not peel up, crack, or turn colors.
Book Repair Wings and Corners
These may not be necessary for every book, but this little repair trick comes in really handy.
The corner edges of books as well as the top and bottom of the spine of the book, are one of the easiest places to damage. Even if you reinforce the spine, the edges can still get easily banged up. It's a difficult place to wrap tape around, without it looking terrible.
Chromalabel's books wings and corners are a one size fits most, pre-cut repair tape. They're made from a cloth material and come in a variety of colors.
No cutting or measuring is required. They will fit right on to the corners. Hassle free. This helps to reinforce your book and give it a little extra life.
Getting Started
Once you have the right tools, you are ready to begin work.
The Spine
Usually the spine is one of the places that needs to be repaired. It's usually as simple as placing some reinforcement tape along the outside of the spine and wrapping around each edge of the book.
The Corners
The corners are the next vulnerable place. They can be easily fixed up by applying ChromaLabel's repair wings and corner.
How much Tape Should I Order?
ChromaLabel's Clear Stretchable Tape comes on a roll of 15 yards. Depending on how large the books are that you need to repair
What Size Tape Do I Order?
We suggest that you leave about a half inch of space on either side of the spine for the tape to fold down. If the book's spine is 1 inch wide, then we suggest buying the 2 inch tape.
