Dry mounting

When dry mounting, the object and source of the paper can be of any type, such as newspaper articles, magazine articles, drawings, etc.

First the tissue (glue sheet) is placed over the foam backing and a small amount is left on the edges for the cropping stage. The source is then placed on the foam backing where it will be tacked down. A small piece of release paper is then placed over the source and the hot tacking iron (180 degrees) is used to spot glue the picture to the foam backing. This is done so that when the backing is lifted with the source on it, the source does not shift or fall off when transferring it to the press.

After tacking, the tissue can then be trimmed. Now you can either trim the source at this stage or wait until after the source has been placed in the press. The source with the backing is then cut to the desired size or shape either by very large sharp straight line cutters or by using specifically designed scissors for shaping the media.

The media is then placed into the press. First, there is a quarter piece of releaseboard placed at the bottom layer of the press. Another piece of release board is then placed on top of the media to protect it from the top layer of the press. The press is then closed and the media is left in for a pre-determined amount of time.

With the release boards in place, the media has very little chance of being burned, but it is still safer to watch the amount of time the media is in the press.

Presses come in all sizes from 12 inches by 12 inches to 24 inches by 30 inches for full posters. These presses can be opened on two sides or three depending on the application.

If the client prefers, the laminate can be added after the media comes out of the press. Laminates are mostly used as a protective coating and come in many types such as non-glare, semi-glare, high gloss, linen, and even canvas.

Before placing the laminate on the media, use a small perforator to make extremely small holes to assist with the fusing of the plastic to the media. The perforator has very small sharp spikes on it and is rolled over the sheet of laminate. This also prevents bubbling when media is placed in a flat area.

There is also a roll type laminator that has a flat bed at the front and the media is actually fed into the front and the laminate is rolled onto the media using very high heat.

When copying newspaper articles to be dry mounted, newspapers have that very thin paper, with an off-white tinge and sometimes the ink is not too clear aand articles or pictures bleed through.

To make a clean white copy, first change the tone of paper making it whiter, before preventing bleed through. This can be achieved by placing the original on the glass then covering it with a black piece of paper. This will prevent the glare from showing up on the copy when the light source passes over the original during copying.

The same is try for dry mounting. To prevent bleed through over time, when dry mounting black type on white paper, a black foam is used instead of the standard white form backing.