My Comic Stacking Experiment

[Tango 'n Cash]

I thought with all the talk about comic book pressing that a personal story of mine might prove interesting. Last weekend I was forced to clean up a storeroom and found a few piles of comics that I had half forgotten about for 4-5 years.

 

I bought a couple of collections 5-6 years back and took out the best comic books for my collection but found that some had been warped and dented by improper storage. Not creased just not perfectly flat. Some of these books were popular and would be easier to sell if flat so I remember carefully bagging and stacking them offset with boards at intervals to keep it flat and provide weight to see if these could be flattened out. These were stacked offset hundreds upon hundreds including individual boards and 100packs of boards on top for added weight. I did not exactly forget about these books but I had no idea how long they were down there until I was given the ultimatum to clean it up.

 

At the end of the day even my best attempts failed and there was no real difference between the books now and then. They were a bit flatter but when you take them out for an inspection these are far fram flat and definitely did not turn out as well as I had hoped when I decided to stack them up. All that pressure for all those years amounted to almost nothing but even though I doubt it would change, granted it is tough to say what 20 or more years would do. I think comic stacking would be a great way to maintain near mint comics but it is hard to believe that a collector would place a fine or very fine comic in a pile for year and come out with a near mint pressed copy. If anyone else has tried this please let me know your results. Thank you.

[drbanner]

Someone (Matt?) said that without the use of heat and/or moisture, you're not going to get any results...which it appears you have not. With heat and/or moisture, you are modifying the fibers and giving them the "elasticity" needed to be re-shaped and as the heat/moisture dissipate, you're left with your newly pressed book!

 

Therefore, pressing with heat/moisture works, pressing without it does not. Which leads me to believe that the fear of books reverting is minimal because if you don't do it correctly, you're not going to get any results.

[Tango 'n Cash]

Therefore, pressing with heat/moisture works, pressing without it does not. Which leads me to believe that the fear of books reverting is minimal because if you don't do it correctly, you're not going to get any results.

 

Probably but my findings were surprising to me anyway since there is so much weight given to stacked comics such as the Mile Highs and their comparison to pressing. In my experience and as you said, there is no comparison at all.

[supapimp]

pressing/stacking is easy, just get a couple of thick pieces of cardborad and load it up with anything that's heavy. (i.e. free weights, heritage catalouges, books, etc.)

[Mister_Mean-migration]

Did you pay Shield his money yet?

[Tango 'n Cash]

But like drbanner said it is not going to really work without heat and moisture. I would hate to estimate the amount of weight those comics on the bottom of the stack were under and for 5 years.

[OldGuy]

Therefore, pressing with heat/moisture works, pressing without it does not. Which leads me to believe that the fear of books reverting is minimal because if you don't do it correctly, you're not going to get any results.

 

Probably but my findings were surprising to me anyway since there is so much weight given to stacked comics such as the Mile Highs and their comparison to pressing. In my experience and as you said, there is no comparison at all.

 

Mile High books were not pressed flat. The started out flat and stayed that way because they were stacked. There wasn't any damage to be undone on the MH books. You're trying to undo damage.

[rjpb]

Years ago I had a GA book with pretty major spine roll. I took a thin steel ruler, put it along the centerfold, and carefully rolled the spine back so that spine roll was minimalized. I stacked about 50 -75 lbs. of hardback books on top of it and left it there for maybe 6 months. When I pulled it out and removed the ruler it remained with most of spine roll now gone.

[PovertyRow]

Mile High books were not pressed flat. The started out flat and stayed that way because they were stacked. There wasn't any damage to be undone on the MH books. You're trying to undo damage.

 

[Tango 'n Cash]

Mile High books were not pressed flat. The started out flat and stayed that way because they were stacked. There wasn't any damage to be undone on the MH books. You're trying to undo damage.

 

My point exactly and I posted my experiment after seeing so many "pressed Mile Highs" comments on here when ever pressing is brought up. I saw no evidence that comic stacking produces any form of pressing so the comparison is invalid.

[garthgantu]

Um, maybe those comments were in reference to the fact that quite a number of Church (Mile High) books have been *cleaned and/or pressed* and resubmitted, with many receiving substantially higher grades..?

[OldGuy]

Mile High books were not pressed flat. The started out flat and stayed that way because they were stacked. There wasn't any damage to be undone on the MH books. You're trying to undo damage.

 

My point exactly and I posted my experiment after seeing so many "pressed Mile Highs" comments on here when ever pressing is brought up. I saw no evidence that comic stacking produces any form of pressing so the comparison is invalid.

 

[Tango 'n Cash]

Um, maybe those comments were in reference to the fact that quite a number of Church (Mile High) books have been *cleaned and/or pressed* and resubmitted, with many receiving substantially higher grades..?

 

Perhaps but I got the impression that people were comparing comic stacking with comic pressing and stating that these were equivalent in some way.

[comicwiz]

Therefore, pressing with heat/moisture works, pressing without it does not. Which leads me to believe that the fear of books reverting is minimal because if you don't do it correctly, you're not going to get any results.

 

I'm of the view that even when NDP strategies are performed correctly, there is a probability that the comic will revert to reveal its pre-exisiting defects. If it were as you say 'minimal', then restorers would guarantee the NDP work they perform for their clients.

 

It just so happens that with the quick turn-style arrangement between prescreener and greedy sellers, pressing for a quick flip merely requires a convincing press job (betweeen listing on eBay, and delivering to the buyer), with no real need for any type of guarantee against reverting. The risk of reverting on the transfer of ownership is neither a concern to the person performing the NDP or their client, but rather the uninformed buyer.

[drbanner]

Years ago I had a GA book with pretty major spine roll. I took a thin steel ruler, put it along the centerfold, and carefully rolled the spine back so that spine roll was minimalized. I stacked about 50 -75 lbs. of hardback books on top of it and left it there for maybe 6 months. When I pulled it out and removed the ruler it remained with most of spine roll now gone.

 

Interesting...did you ever notice the spine roll returning over time?

[rjpb]

I had the book for another year before I sold it, but in that time the spine roll did not return.

[PovertyRow]

Um, maybe those comments were in reference to the fact that quite a number of Church (Mile High) books have been *cleaned and/or pressed* and resubmitted, with many receiving substantially higher grades..?

 

Some may have ref's the cleaned/pressed Church's, Garth, but many more did equate the Church Stacking to pressing, where you will always see my standard reply.

 

Considering the Church collection was found in the Bronze Age, there has been plenty of time for the books to actually warrant a c/p after being in collector's hands for so long.

 

I actually brought this up a while ago in, I believe, the GA forum.

 

[comicwiz]

I had the book for another year before I sold it, but in that time the spine roll did not return.

 

There is a member who posted on the cpg forums that discussed his experiment with pressing... in it, he appears to arrive at a different conclusion on his NDP experiment in removing spine roll, and how it might revert if liberated from the slab:

 

http://www.comicspriceguide.com/forum2/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=20704