Gluing Leather Together

[Anonnymouse]

Hello,

I am having difficulty gluing my two leather articles together. It is a notebook. The veg-tanned front has been tooled, and has had cardboard glued on the back. There were three peices of cardboard; 2 large cover chunks and a spine piece. I used a v-gouge to cut out two lines for the notebook to fold on. I have one half of the calfskin (I think it is calfskin) glued on with some crappy Tandy Eco-flo cement. My problem is that I cannot avoid the wrinkles. If I form the calfskin into the cracks between the cardboard chunks, while the book is flat, then when I fold the notebook up the calfskin wrinkles. If I form it while it's folded, then it wrinkles or just pulls apart when I unfold it. Argh! I'm pulling my hair out over this one. Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

Cover:

This is a wrinkle:

This is the cracks between the cardboard. I am trying to shove the calfskin into those cracks, but it always wrinkles when folded or unfolded (the reverse of how it was formed).

[45LC]

Since you're being overwhelmed with comments I will add my two cents worth. What you are calling a wrinkle is a natural occurrence. Remember the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. When you wrap anything around something it's going to take more of it to go the distance. When you lay it flat again the excess it took to go the distance has to go somewhere so it forms itself into what you call a wrinkle, bulge or a hump on the binding. All good books do the same thing. The bookbinder makes a flat tube and glues it on the spine before the cover goes on. That tube opens up when the book is opened and the outside cover which is attached to and rides with that tube becomes a wrinkle or bulge. Look at a good book and you can almost stick your finger in the opening at the binding. Your leather is doing the same thing.

You're not going to get rid of it so work with it. If you made grooves at the binding you're in good shape. Cut the inside covering and glue it on each side and a narrow thin strip on the binding. Let the outside cover do the flexing at the grooves and let it do what you call wrinkle on the outside. Leave a small gap at the grooves and you will have done a good job. You've eliminated the extra distance on the inside. When you try to shove the leather down into the grooves you're using extra leather because you're going a further distance than if you leave it flat. When you close the book you decrease the distance on the inside so it's going to wrinkle on the inside. In your case you're going to get a wrinkle on the outside and the inside with reverse actions. Outside when you open it and inside when you close it if you don't make the grooves. You can at least eliminate the wrinkles on the inside but not the outside. If this doesn't make sense let me know. I promise I can probably make it more confusing.

[Anonnymouse]

Hi,

Thanks for the comment, it made sense for the most part. I did some more work on it, and I have managed to make it lie very flat when opened with only a slight wrinkling at the spine dips. I stopped using the Tandy cement stuff and used some good Elmer's spray-on glue; I use it to make my origami paper. It worked great on the leather. Overnight I set some huge textbooks on it with some pieces of cardboard set on the grooves. I'll post a pic later; perhaps when I'm finished.

[Rhide]

Did you also miter the edges of your cardboard? If not, It may be pushing against itself when you close your notebook. All these pieces need to work in the same way to be a fixed hinge. At this point, maybe just run a creaser next to the wrinkle to make it look like a bound book spine?

[Anonnymouse]

I am not sure what you mean by mitering the edges of the cardboard?

[Rhide]

Bevel or cut at an angle to match the groove in your leather. I'm fairly new to leatherworking myself so, maybe I'm way off base here. I'm using ideas gained during a career as a cabinet maker and they may not be applicable on what you're doing. If I were doing this, I would probably glue the leather to the cardboard and then cut the groove, so that all pieces work on the same plane. I hope this helps. Good luck.

[Anonnymouse]

I think I see what you mean... The cardboard was very thin, and it did not cover the v-gouged grooves.