Bookbinding and the Conservation of Books
A Dictionary of Descriptive Terminology

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folding

The process of folding flat printed sheets into sections. The number of leaves in a single folded sheet is always a multiple of two: 4, 8, 16, 32, and 64 leaves, giving 8, 16, 32, 64, and 128 pages respectively. Sections with 6, 12, 18 etc., leaves may be obtained by the use of other than standard types of folding, or by the use of more than one sheet, e.g., an envelope fold followed by a right angle fold will give 6 leaves (12 pages), or a full sheet folded three times, plus a half sheet folded twice and insetted within the full sheet will give a section of 12 leaves (24 pages). Although a single sheet of paper can be folded nine times, in bookwork it is unusual to find a sheet folded more than four times, and most sheets are slit or perforated if they are to be folded at right angles more than twice, so as to reduce wrinkling and buckling.

The principal folds are the parallel (or buckle) and right angle, with the latter being the most commonly used fold in bookwork. The parallel fold is generally used for very narrow books, or for those that are printed TWO UP .

The third most commonly used fold, though used far less than either of the preceding, is the concertina fold, which is used for maps and folders, as well as for some book sections.

Almost all folding today is done by machine; however, in the early days of the folding machine, the work was so inaccurate that good folding could be done only by hand.

Folding is done "to the paper" or "to the print," i.e., register. See also: FOLD TO PAPER ;FOLD TO PRINT ;FOLDING MACHINES ;IMPOSITION ;REGISTER (4) .

(82 , 182 , 229 , 234 , 335 , 339 , 343 )




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