And people wonder why folks get a little bit peeved...

[Foolkiller]

I've watched several of the of the pro-pressing crowd in here claim that pressing does absolutely no harm to a comic book. The response we got back from the LOC disagrees with that statement. And since I've yet to come accross anyone in here that knows more about paper preservation and conservation than a conservator at the U.S. Library of Congress would...please forgive me for putting a little bit more weight on what they have to say on the subject.

 

And that's where I can't agree. I put very, very little stock in that conservator without more information. Now, where I agree is that you can't definitively say that pressing does "no" harm to a comic book either.

[awe4one]

I know because I've asked the dealers. Of course some people ask. I'm sure you do, and Chris, and Flaming Telepath(if he buys books that fall into the "might be pressed" category). But ask Richard, or Dale, or Rick, and they'll tell you that the question is asked so infrequently that one can only come to the conclusion that in the real world(meaning off the boards), it's a non-issue. There are probably more people put off by dust shadows than by pressing.

 

Because there is nothing like the level of awareness there is here on the boards in the general population.

 

Because there are huge swathes of the collecting population who only know pressing from Overstreet, where it was classified as restoration for decades, and assume that like any other form of restoration, it would be proactively disclosed at point of sale.

 

Nick, you speak as if board members who are aware of pressing aren't also part of the general population and buying books from dealers through websites and at conventions. The vast majority of even those knowledgeable people are not asking the question.

 

Maybe...but speaking for myself, I do ask. And like I said in a previous post, it makes for a rather uncomfortable transaction when you do it at cons. It's like you sucked the air out of the room...

 

Jim

[Foolkiller]

I have read the studies. We've discussed them at length in the resto forum. I've pointed that out.

 

And that's what my point was. Here's someone who's read the studies and deconstructed them. It may not be the conservator's point on the studies, it may be the studies themselves, it may be a whole host of possibilities, but you can't put stock in one series of studies without a little more examination.

[nearmint]

I know because I've asked the dealers. Of course some people ask. I'm sure you do, and Chris, and Flaming Telepath(if he buys books that fall into the "might be pressed" category). But ask Richard, or Dale, or Rick, and they'll tell you that the question is asked so infrequently that one can only come to the conclusion that in the real world(meaning off the boards), it's a non-issue. There are probably more people put off by dust shadows than by pressing.

 

Because there is nothing like the level of awareness there is here on the boards in the general population.

 

Because there are huge swathes of the collecting population who only know pressing from Overstreet, where it was classified as restoration for decades, and assume that like any other form of restoration, it would be proactively disclosed at point of sale.

 

Nick, you speak as if board members who are aware of pressing aren't also part of the general population and buying books from dealers through websites and at conventions. The vast majority of even those knowledgeable people are not asking the question.

 

Maybe...but speaking for myself, I do ask. And like I said in a previous post, it makes for a rather uncomfortable transaction when you do it at cons. It's like you sucked the air out of the room...

 

Jim

 

I'm sure it's an uncomfortable topic with many dealers. But some, like Richard for example, discuss it openly. Heck, I consider Richard a good friend, and he knows very well that I couldn't care less about pressing, but he still proactively discloses to me.

[awe4one]

I know because I've asked the dealers. Of course some people ask. I'm sure you do, and Chris, and Flaming Telepath(if he buys books that fall into the "might be pressed" category). But ask Richard, or Dale, or Rick, and they'll tell you that the question is asked so infrequently that one can only come to the conclusion that in the real world(meaning off the boards), it's a non-issue. There are probably more people put off by dust shadows than by pressing.

 

Because there is nothing like the level of awareness there is here on the boards in the general population.

 

Because there are huge swathes of the collecting population who only know pressing from Overstreet, where it was classified as restoration for decades, and assume that like any other form of restoration, it would be proactively disclosed at point of sale.

 

Nick, you speak as if board members who are aware of pressing aren't also part of the general population and buying books from dealers through websites and at conventions. The vast majority of even those knowledgeable people are not asking the question.

 

Maybe...but speaking for myself, I do ask. And like I said in a previous post, it makes for a rather uncomfortable transaction when you do it at cons. It's like you sucked the air out of the room...

 

Jim

 

I'm sure it's an uncomfortable topic with many dealers. But some, like Richard for example, discuss it openly. Heck, I consider Richard a good friend, and he knows very well that I couldn't care less about pressing, but he still proactively discloses to me.

 

You're right...Rich was one of the exceptions. Dale also.

 

Jim

[Ze-man]

That's where we're going to have to agree to disagree then. Because I feel it's extemely obvious that the information provided by the U.S. Library of Congress is worth far more than your "seat of the pants" example that you trotted out. No information is going to be universally accepted in here, no matter how factual it might be. But a question was posed to a professional conservator at the LOC and they responded very clearly to it.

 

And yes...there is real evidence that pressing does harm to a book. Pressing involves the application of heat. And the LOC stated clearly that studies have shown that increased heat accelerates paper aging. There really isn't any need to extrapolate anything to get it to comics. Increased heat accelerates the paper aging process. Pressers use increased heat to press comics. Not really much of an extrapolation going on there.

 

I've watched several of the of the pro-pressing crowd in here claim that pressing does absolutely no harm to a comic book. The response we got back from the LOC disagrees with that statement. And since I've yet to come accross anyone in here that knows more about paper preservation and conservation than a conservator at the U.S. Library of Congress would...please forgive me for putting a little bit more weight on what they have to say on the subject.

 

 

I think you need to also include FF's follow up post to the reply he got from the LOC

 

I can't decide whether or not the conservator was focusing on her response,which makes me wonder how much to trust it. The entire second half of it focuses on the best way to store comics, which isn't something I asked about. I'm sure she was just trying to be helpful, throwing out as much conservation info as she thought of that could be useful to me. But it seems weird for her to have taken the time to include all those links to bags and boards, as if perhaps she had no reference to offer on the danger of heat and moisture pressing so she decided to offer some storage references instead.

 

A pertinent and probing followup into the nature of the danger she's describing with regards to heat and moisture could be useful. You know that some library or company has done pressing-related experiments similar to or the same as the ones people have been proposing in this thread--maybe a LoC conservator would dig some of that up if specifically prodded to.

 

I have had the good fortune to work with many conservation labs over the last 2 years. They think differently then we do, her reference to "increased heat accelerates paper aging" more then likely refers to the various MIT fold tests conducted to test a papers strength after being baked in an oven, but since she did not quote specifics it is hard to say what she meant exactly.

 

Your argument that heat pressing causes damage to a comic is not entirely unfounded and worth discussing. All the recent rash of "heat plate johnny's" (for lack of a better term) who are cooking books to try and get a grade are obviously not good for the hobby. But as many have said already in this thread, specific studies that show at what rate a pressed comic book ages, and how much it ages at what temp used are needed to back up the vague reference you have quoted so many times from the LOC to further this conversation beyond opinion.

 

And as long as we are all offering up opinons, I believe pressing if done correctly does not cause any more damage,or even less then a book that was sitting on tarmac for hours waiting to be flown across the globe, carted around by a mailman only to sit on someone's porch for hours in the snow only to be brought in and exposed to a dramatic temp swing.. Both MAY cause damage to the comic on some level, but it is negligible. Not to mention a comic is bought, sold, carted and shipped around the world under god knows what conditions perhaps dozens of times over it's 40 + years. But because pressing is done intentionally for mainly monetary reasons it is singled out as being "bad damage"

 

Susan , Tracey and Matt all press comics as part of restoring a comic. Susan, and Tracey are self professed "conservation minded" folk, if pressing was overly harmful to the long term life of a comic do you really think they would do it?

 

Once I saw what pressing involves firsthand it made me realize it was simply not an issue for me. I can understand and respect that it is to others, and that disclosure is the best way for a buyer to make as informed a decision as possible. But to temper that disclosure with the knowledge that a comic is not going to go "poof" any time soon , if ever just because it was pressed.

 

So I say you should spend your time writing up a response Email to the LOC instead of trying to convince everybody the jig is up because of one comment pulled from one email, because I honestly think people would love to discuss real time results of how pressing relates to comics. But aside from the tests Wilson did years ago there simply are none that I am aware of.

 

 

[lizards2]

That's where we're going to have to agree to disagree then. Because I feel it's extemely obvious that the information provided by the U.S. Library of Congress is worth far more than your "seat of the pants" example that you trotted out. No information is going to be universally accepted in here, no matter how factual it might be. But a question was posed to a professional conservator at the LOC and they responded very clearly to it.

 

And yes...there is real evidence that pressing does harm to a book. Pressing involves the application of heat. And the LOC stated clearly that studies have shown that increased heat accelerates paper aging. There really isn't any need to extrapolate anything to get it to comics. Increased heat accelerates the paper aging process. Pressers use increased heat to press comics. Not really much of an extrapolation going on there.

 

I've watched several of the of the pro-pressing crowd in here claim that pressing does absolutely no harm to a comic book. The response we got back from the LOC disagrees with that statement. And since I've yet to come accross anyone in here that knows more about paper preservation and conservation than a conservator at the U.S. Library of Congress would...please forgive me for putting a little bit more weight on what they have to say on the subject.

 

 

I think you need to also include FF's follow up post to the reply he got from the LOC

 

I can't decide whether or not the conservator was focusing on her response,which makes me wonder how much to trust it. The entire second half of it focuses on the best way to store comics, which isn't something I asked about. I'm sure she was just trying to be helpful, throwing out as much conservation info as she thought of that could be useful to me. But it seems weird for her to have taken the time to include all those links to bags and boards, as if perhaps she had no reference to offer on the danger of heat and moisture pressing so she decided to offer some storage references instead.

 

A pertinent and probing followup into the nature of the danger she's describing with regards to heat and moisture could be useful. You know that some library or company has done pressing-related experiments similar to or the same as the ones people have been proposing in this thread--maybe a LoC conservator would dig some of that up if specifically prodded to.

 

I have had the good fortune to work with many conservation labs over the last 2 years. They think differently then we do, her reference to "increased heat accelerates paper aging" more then likely refers to the various MIT fold tests conducted to test a papers strength after being baked in an oven, but since she did not quote specifics it is hard to say what she meant exactly.

 

Your argument that heat pressing causes damage to a comic is not entirely unfounded and worth discussing. All the recent rash of "heat plate johnny's" (for lack of a better term) who are cooking books to try and get a grade are obviously not good for the hobby. But as many have said already in this thread, specific studies that show at what rate a pressed comic book ages, and how much it ages at what temp used are needed to back up the vague reference you have quoted so many times from the LOC to further this conversation beyond opinion.

 

And as long as we are all offering up opinons, I believe pressing if done correctly does not cause any more damage,or even less then a book that was sitting on tarmac for hours waiting to be flown across the globe, carted around by a mailman only to sit on someone's porch for hours in the snow only to be brought in and exposed to a dramatic temp swing.. Both MAY cause damage to the comic on some level, but it is negligible. Not to mention a comic is bought, sold, carted and shipped around the world under god knows what conditions perhaps dozens of times over it's 40 + years. But because pressing is done intentionally for mainly monetary reasons it is singled out as being "bad damage"

 

Susan , Tracey and Matt all press comics as part of restoring a comic. Susan, and Tracey are self professed "conservation minded" folk, if pressing was overly harmful to the long term life of a comic do you really think they would do it?

 

Once I saw what pressing involves firsthand it made me realize it was simply not an issue for me. I can understand and respect that it is to others, and that disclosure is the best way for a buyer to make as informed a decision as possible. But to temper that disclosure with the knowledge that a comic is not going to go "poof" any time soon , if ever just because it was pressed.

 

So I say you should spend your time writing up a response Email to the LOC instead of trying to convince everybody the jig is up because of one comment pulled from one email, because I honestly think people would love to discuss real time results of how pressing relates to comics. Aside from the tests Wilson did years ago there simply are none that I am aware of.

 

 

Thanks for this - I think it's what has been missing from a lot of these emotional posts - I want a discussion of the facts and chemistry. I don't know how pressing is done, or what the mechanics are - educate me, like Ze-man has partially done. I think it is incumbent upon the pressing crowd to show me the proof that pressing does no harm, not for the anti-pressers to prove it does harm. I want the manipulators to speak.

[tth2]

Of course some people ask. I'm sure you do, and Chris, and Flaming Telepath(if he buys books that fall into the "might be pressed" category). But ask Richard, or Dale, or Rick, and they'll tell you that the question is asked so infrequently that one can only come to the conclusion that in the real world(meaning off the boards), it's a non-issue. There are probably more people put off by dust shadows than by pressing.

But of the people who don't ask, how many are aware of pressing and therefore even know to ask, and of those who do know, how many care about pressing? Without that information, it's a bit misleading to say that just because lots of people don't ask therefore means that people who know and care about pressing never ask.

 

Tim, to think logically about it, I think you have to turn your argument around. Forget about the people who don't know about pressing. Of course, they can't ask. But even if you just consider the number of anti-pressers here on the boards, dealers just aren't getting the question.

Jeff, if you said that dealers aren't getting the question from the known anti-pressers here on the boards, then I'd concede that you've made a valid point.

[tth2]

Thanks for this - I think it's what has been missing from a lot of these emotional posts - I want a discussion of the facts and chemistry. I don't know how pressing is done, or what the mechanics are - educate me, like Ze-man has partially done. I think it is incumbent upon the pressing crowd to show me the proof that pressing does no harm, not for the anti-pressers to prove it does harm. I want the manipulators to speak.

Actually, I for one don't care if pressing damages the book or not. I mean I do believe that it does, but even if there were indisputable evidence that it doesn't, it wouldn't change my opposition to pressing.

 

It's the same that I don't care if steroids or doping harms the health of athletes who juice. What I care about is that it undermines the integrity of their athletic performance. Even if pressing doesn't harm a book, I'm opposed to the fact that it undermines the integrity of the book's grade by making it look better than it really is, in the same way that steroids made Barry Bonds a better home run hitter than he really was.

[conditionfreak]

I believe, after wading through this all AND USING COMMON SENSE. That pressing does harm the book ever so slightly, but not enough to make me not do it.

 

I am not a conservator nor scientist and have not read any studies on this subject. But I do understand that if you put moisture and high temp heat to paper, it can not be good for it in the long run. It HAS TOO do something to the paper. But maybe no more than the moisture of a basement for a month, or the heat of a closed car during a summer day in Texas.

 

But it has to do something not good for the paper product. You will never convince me otherwise, without a hundred year test.

 

I believe that Domo has won this debate with more professional backup, than those opposed to his statements. The assertion that the LOC professional has more credentials concerning this subject, than Joe Blow or Mary Poppins who have been collecting comics for 20 years, seems to me to be a winner.

 

No matter how you slice it. If your common sense does not tell you that high heat and moisture applied to a paper product, even for a short duration, will do something (however slight) harmful, then your common sense batteries need replacing.

 

Having said all of that. I still believe that the damage from a well done professional pressing, is nothing to worry about. The pressed book will outlive all of us, if nothing else damages it except the pressing. The professional and well done pressing damage is negligible.

 

negligible: "so small, trifling, or unimportant that it may safely be neglected or disregarded".

 

If you have a pressed CGC 9.8 SS copy of Supergirl #1 with Michael Turners signature, I hereby offer you the exact same price that a non-pressed copy of the same, would be valued at. It won't bother me a bit that it is pressed. It ain't gonna fall apart on me in my lifetime, and not in my sons lifetime either.

 

It might get stolen, or burned in a fire, or destroyed in a flood, or even confiscated as contraband by the government. But it ain't gonna fall apart.

 

Reminds me of all those commercials about termites destroying homes. Have you ever been driving down a street and saw a house fall down because termites destroyed it?

 

No. I didn't think so.

 

You won't see a pressed book fall apart in your slab either. Ever.

 

Domo, you win on a technicality. TKO. IMO.

[awe4one]

 

I disagree. Regardless whether pressing harms the comic, and it pretty clear it does, ,then why the dissent concerning the opposition to the practice?

 

We in this hobby are very anal about protrcting our comics. We piut boards behind them. We place them in bags. We even spend the cash for mylars. All in the pursuit to preserve our comics.

 

Yet when you discuss pressing it's OK to add heat and moisture to the comics. Things that we were protecting comics against because we knew that heat and moisture were BAD for comics. That's a conundrum and hard to comprehend when talking about pressing comics....

 

You can talk about "no damage", "little damage", whatever, but the fact is the comics are being artifically manipulated. The comics are not what they were before.

 

And to imply collectors are on the hook to ask if this procedure has been been done is disingenuous . They didn't manipulated the comic. The seller did...

 

Jim

[JiveTurkeyMoFo]

That's where we're going to have to agree to disagree then. Because I feel it's extemely obvious that the information provided by the U.S. Library of Congress is worth far more than your "seat of the pants" example that you trotted out. No information is going to be universally accepted in here, no matter how factual it might be. But a question was posed to a professional conservator at the LOC and they responded very clearly to it.

 

And yes...there is real evidence that pressing does harm to a book. Pressing involves the application of heat. And the LOC stated clearly that studies have shown that increased heat accelerates paper aging. There really isn't any need to extrapolate anything to get it to comics. Increased heat accelerates the paper aging process. Pressers use increased heat to press comics. Not really much of an extrapolation going on there.

 

I've watched several of the of the pro-pressing crowd in here claim that pressing does absolutely no harm to a comic book. The response we got back from the LOC disagrees with that statement. And since I've yet to come accross anyone in here that knows more about paper preservation and conservation than a conservator at the U.S. Library of Congress would...please forgive me for putting a little bit more weight on what they have to say on the subject.

 

 

I think you need to also include FF's follow up post to the reply he got from the LOC

 

I can't decide whether or not the conservator was focusing on her response,which makes me wonder how much to trust it. The entire second half of it focuses on the best way to store comics, which isn't something I asked about. I'm sure she was just trying to be helpful, throwing out as much conservation info as she thought of that could be useful to me. But it seems weird for her to have taken the time to include all those links to bags and boards, as if perhaps she had no reference to offer on the danger of heat and moisture pressing so she decided to offer some storage references instead.

 

A pertinent and probing followup into the nature of the danger she's describing with regards to heat and moisture could be useful. You know that some library or company has done pressing-related experiments similar to or the same as the ones people have been proposing in this thread--maybe a LoC conservator would dig some of that up if specifically prodded to.

 

I have had the good fortune to work with many conservation labs over the last 2 years. They think differently then we do, her reference to "increased heat accelerates paper aging" more then likely refers to the various MIT fold tests conducted to test a papers strength after being baked in an oven, but since she did not quote specifics it is hard to say what she meant exactly.

 

Your argument that heat pressing causes damage to a comic is not entirely unfounded and worth discussing. All the recent rash of "heat plate johnny's" (for lack of a better term) who are cooking books to try and get a grade are obviously not good for the hobby. But as many have said already in this thread, specific studies that show at what rate a pressed comic book ages, and how much it ages at what temp used are needed to back up the vague reference you have quoted so many times from the LOC to further this conversation beyond opinion.

 

And as long as we are all offering up opinons, I believe pressing if done correctly does not cause any more damage,or even less then a book that was sitting on tarmac for hours waiting to be flown across the globe, carted around by a mailman only to sit on someone's porch for hours in the snow only to be brought in and exposed to a dramatic temp swing.. Both MAY cause damage to the comic on some level, but it is negligible. Not to mention a comic is bought, sold, carted and shipped around the world under god knows what conditions perhaps dozens of times over it's 40 + years. But because pressing is done intentionally for mainly monetary reasons it is singled out as being "bad damage"

 

Susan , Tracey and Matt all press comics as part of restoring a comic. Susan, and Tracey are self professed "conservation minded" folk, if pressing was overly harmful to the long term life of a comic do you really think they would do it?

 

Once I saw what pressing involves firsthand it made me realize it was simply not an issue for me. I can understand and respect that it is to others, and that disclosure is the best way for a buyer to make as informed a decision as possible. But to temper that disclosure with the knowledge that a comic is not going to go "poof" any time soon , if ever just because it was pressed.

 

So I say you should spend your time writing up a response Email to the LOC instead of trying to convince everybody the jig is up because of one comment pulled from one email, because I honestly think people would love to discuss real time results of how pressing relates to comics. But aside from the tests Wilson did years ago there simply are none that I am aware of.

 

 

You're opinion doesn't mean anything Kenny, since you restore comics for a living.

 

However, if you were some unknown conservator from the Library of Congress, whose opinions could be used, without the benefit of specifics, to fit a particular agenda, then your opinion would be.... (worship)

 

[comicwiz]

 

The height of irrationality though has to be this myth that all books can be improved through pressing.

 

My point as attempted above.

 

Good show, Joseph.

 

This is not what I've stated. Book B in my example above is known, ex ante, not to have been pressed. Furthermore, Book B may or may not be able to be improved through pressing. That is why I said Book B has "option value" - it may be able to be improved, it may not. What we do know is that Book A has no option value as it has already been potentialized.

 

Also, that is not even the crux of my argument - it is a supplemental, objective economic/financial argument for those who do not accept the compelling, but subjective, argument that a book which has achieved its grade naturally is superior to one that has spent time as a lower grade and was manipulated to a higher grade through artificial means, or the contention that pressing can cause long-term damage to books that may not be immediately apparent.

 

With all due respect Gene, the developed logic your presenting as an argument against pressing is IMHO a manifestation of deep-rooted neurosis, and when it develops to the degree that you find yourself calling out complete strangers as indecent people, then its time to seek help or switch hobbies.

 

2. There is no myth that all books can be improved through pressing. Collectors aware of what pressing is and does know that it can be used to improve the CGC grade of only a fraction of books.

 

3. It is a fact, whether you like it or not and whether you agree with it or not, that a subset of collectors do not want to purchase books that have been pressed. It is also a fact that the ever increasing number of comics that have been pressed has caused and will continue to cause some collectors to leave HG comic collecting.

 

 

I wasn't referring to Gene alone in my statement, but rather those who are lashing out at people making lewd comments and statements of indecency/dishonesty against anyone who presses.

 

Look, I don't want to be argumentative here, but how do you know that "all books can be pressed" isn't a myth? Are you going by what others have told you - what you've read on these boards - or have you actually experimented with a dry mount press?

 

So you're telling me that if a book has NO colour-breaking creases, warping, spine roll and its only defect is a spine tick that breaks colour (a clean break) that has NO residual surface wear or damage other than the colour breaking tick of spine stress, you would still be able to eke out a higher grade on it?? If so, please explain (anyone) to me how this would be accomplished.

 

For most people on here who are against the practice, they are being held captive by their emotions, and very few of them have actually applied any experimentation or independent research to base their opinions and inform their reasoning capacity. Until that happens, they aren't really in any position be able to present anything constructive to the topic, and quite frankly, aren't well informed enough to disprove my statement that not all books can be improved by pressing.

 

As for your point in number 3, this is plain hypocrisy. On the one hand those who buy/sell pressed books are castigated for perpetuating this problem, but on the other, those vocally against pressing aren't exactly abating their desire to seek out high-grade slabbed books. Like I said before, seek out help to control the neurotic behaviour or choose another hobby. To call people out and malign them in the way some have here is wrong.

[Flaming_Telepath]

Susan , Tracey and Matt all press comics as part of restoring a comic. Susan, and Tracey are self professed "conservation minded" folk, if pressing was overly harmful to the long term life of a comic do you really think they would do it?

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't Susan now stated that she will no longer press comics unless it's part of a larger overhaul of the book? She doesn't believe that the benefit accrued outweighs the potential damage?

[Norrin_Radd]

Sorry. I usually don't get involved in these discussions but...

 

Are you actually stating that people that are against pressing don't know enough to have an intelligent opinion?!?!?!

 

Sorry, but it's time to pull this out of retirement.

 

 

[Old Fashion PB and J]

Susan , Tracey and Matt all press comics as part of restoring a comic. Susan, and Tracey are self professed "conservation minded" folk, if pressing was overly harmful to the long term life of a comic do you really think they would do it?

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't Susan now stated that she will no longer press comics unless it's part of a larger overhaul of the book? She doesn't believe that the benefit accrued outweighs the potential damage?

That is what I was told about susan and pressing.

[comicwiz]

Sorry. I usually don't get involved in these discussions but...

 

Are you actually stating that people that are against pressing don't know enough to have an intelligent opinion?!?!?!

 

Sorry, but it's time to pull this out of retirement.

 

 

 

 

Nice try - read carefully - I'm saying not all books can be improved by pressing, and anyone that wants to disprove should base their opinions with fact, and not

 

[Old Fashion PB and J]

Sorry. I usually don't get involved in these discussions but...

 

Are you actually stating that people that are against pressing don't know enough to have an intelligent opinion?!?!?!

 

Sorry, but it's time to pull this out of retirement.

 

 

Yes, those who press books are superior in intellect. They also have cooler comic books, and way sweeter hair.

[Old Fashion PB and J]

Sorry. I usually don't get involved in these discussions but...

 

Are you actually stating that people that are against pressing don't know enough to have an intelligent opinion?!?!?!

 

Sorry, but it's time to pull this out of retirement.

 

 

 

 

Nice try - read carefully - I'm saying not all books can be improved by pressing, and anyone that wants to disprove should base their opinions with fact, and not

 

Two way street. Can anyone who presses books actually prove that there will NOT be any long term effects?

[comicwiz]

Sorry. I usually don't get involved in these discussions but...

 

Are you actually stating that people that are against pressing don't know enough to have an intelligent opinion?!?!?!

 

Sorry, but it's time to pull this out of retirement.

 

 

 

 

Nice try - read carefully - I'm saying not all books can be improved by pressing, and anyone that wants to disprove should base their opinions with fact, and not

 

Two way street. Can anyone who presses books actually prove that there will NOT be any long term effects?

 

Sure, and I respect that opinion because I've always believed that no matter how aggressive the procedure to correct a comic through pressing, there is a chance the problem may return with time. Books from this category should not be pressed (as with your point, because its likely going to damage the book, and will likely need to have the process repeated to try to correct it when it returns, which exposes it to further damage with each repeated procedure). However books from this category are rarely if ever in the high-grade strata but are worked on because either the problem detracts from the appeal (spine rolll) or it would be worth more money if the condition problem could somehow be corrected (I'm profiling GA as the fit for this category).

 

Then there is another category of books which you simply cannot improve because there is wear on the spine (as described in my previous post) which cannot be improved without being flagged by a purple label.

 

When you combine the two, you have quite an extensive inventory of back issue comics that fall into these categories, and to make blanket statements that all comics could be improved by pressing is, as I've said before, a myth.