Pressing Cards or documents - better than heavy books

[Runscott]

Some day someone might find this useful.

I was re-binding a rare book that needed the signatures pressed and held in a particular position, so I built a book press. A book press works a million per cent better to flatten paper and cards than putting them under a pile of books.

But they are expensive - cheapest I found was a $225 contraption that looked...cheap. The simplest and and most cost-effective way to build your own is to get a couple of clamps (4 1/2" if you plan to press books) and two smooth pieces of 1/2-3/4" wood. Put the card between typing paper, place that between the blocks of wood and then clamp the pieces of wood together with two clamps. I built such a device for $14 and wish I had thought of it back in the days when I was washing glued-on paper from t206 cards. The device shown below is my upgrade, as I found that I wanted to straighten out a few more warped books. If it works for books, imagine what it will do for a t206 or a warped document.

The following was made with a fancy $21 clamp from Lowe's that has a large screw in the middle at the bottom, and a greased bolt on either side. I got two pieces of purpleheart (you need very hard wood to press books this way) and used the two cheap clamps for the top of the wood. It actually flattens books and cost about $60 (over $20 for the purpleheart - you can get by with scrap wood for baseball cards). You can put a piece of cardboard between the clamps to separate the greasy bolts from the bottom of your wood. There are also two screw-holes on either side of the clamp that are perfect for screwing your board directly to the clamp sides for permanency, but purpleheart is VERY hard and your screws could break. Other hardwoods will take screws better and will work just fine - I just like purpleheart.

This is also good for flattening documents that get wet - just be sure that your pieces of wood are large enough, and smooth.