Acrylic/ Static/ Float mount/ Box framing

FrameArt

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Best ways to deal with static, especially when making a box frame.Today I am being tortured with acrylic static charge while I build custom box spacers for a medium weight paper. Next week I start a similar job of 30 pieces and most are tracing paper drawings. Can you get away with just top hinging, these have to travel to Italy for a show. A lot of questions, but any idea on any of these ? would be much appreciated in this stressful time.
Thanks
 
Check out the articles on hinging on the FrameTek.com website. Loose bottom hinges are very necessary to keep the art from swinging or moving up-wards and peeling the top hinges.
Also read the article on framing with acrylic.
 
tracing paper drawings

I would use a loose bottom side hinge on both sides to keep it from swinging against the acrylic. I would also be concerned if the items are original pencil or pastel tracings. The Graphite from the pencil or the caulk from the pastel will attach to the acrylic no matter what you do short of fixing the items.
 
Check out the articles on hinging on the FrameTek.com website. Loose bottom hinges are very necessary to keep the art from swinging or moving up-wards and peeling the top hinges.
Also read the article on framing with acrylic.


Greg - I have a question about your long/short (or tight/loose) hinging technique. It makes perfect sense to have the T-part of the hinge higher and one hinge "tighter" but recently a customer brought in a couple of matted but unframed wc's that I had matted for an artist to sell. One of the pieces looked like a hinge had let go but when I opened the mat it seems the "long" hinge had allowed the wc to slip up inside the top of the mat, due to being handled carelessly. It was OK but I worry about what would have happened if it had been a pastel. How "loose" should the loose hinges be - ie how much higher can the cross piece be to allow expansion but still hold piece in place?
 
How "loose" should the loose hinges be

Those hinges should be loose enough for the art to move slightly sideways but not loose enough so the art touches the glass. The looseness is so the art can move with expansion and contraction and also for a bit of movement when when moving or transporting the framed art. Generally 1/8" is more than enough but it is dependent upon the art and the framing techniques and taking that into consideration the looseness could be required to be more or even a little less.
 
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Thanks Greg- Some new ideas for me. When mounting paper work for on mat floating or without mat window I like to cut a bevel to draw the tape from behind. This may not be considered the strongest by your article?, but I have been getting away with it for 20 years and I like the accessibility to safely free the art from the mount. When I've added the dreaded lower hinges, often on the bottom side, I usually am not happy. With this technique I could raise the mount a little higher from the bottom and have the tape hanging down (drawn through from back in v-hinge style) and wet the bottom half (1/4") of 1/2" or less exposed tape. Not what the article is exactly saying, but I often have my own take and see how this can work.
Still I am concerned about the large job, graphite on tracing paper, and being shipped to Italy. He wants three for a show next week so I hope to get it right first time. The plan is mount on mat, 1" space all around, with 1/4" black spacers and acrylic glaze.
Any other ideas that I can reconstruct in my own mold!?
 
The rest of the story if you didn't understand the loose hinge method is: Gravity sucks straight down. So the one hinge T'd close to the edge of the art keeps the art from moving sideways. The other hinge(s) should be T'd higher so that the art and the backing board can expand and contract with changes in humidity without tugging on the hinges and buckling the art. They will all be pulled down by gravity so the art will remain level. The loose bottom hinges are to keep the art from moving upwards and putting the primary (top) hinges from going into the "Peel" mode. This will even happen if the art is turned 90 degrees sideways. All the hinges should be in the "Shear"mode because the peel mode is very weak. To demonstrate the difference, take a long piece of scotch tape and adhere it to the edge of your work table. Pull straight out from the table (shear mode) and see how much effort it takes to break the bond or the tape. Now pull the tape back over on itself towards the center of the table (peel mode). Comes off really easily doesn't it? That's why just hinging at the top only with two or more T'd hinges often fail - especially during handling and shipping. V hinges are all set up in the "peel" mode. Boooo!
The museum types rarely ship hinged art and their art lives in humidity controlled museums. Not real life like what we have to deal with.

Years ago, my daughter Kirsten, did a controlled expansion test on lots of mat boards we used in our shop. She cut 2" wide strips, 30" long both with and across the mat grain. She baked them out in our heat/vacuum dry mount press 'till they were crispy dry. Measured and put a razor cut mark at the 29" mark. Then placed them overnight in a mat board plastic bag with a wet sponge. Measured again and put a razor cut mark at 29". The worst sample expanded 3/16 inch! 4 ply rag!!!!!! The Alpha Mats only gained 1/16" Granted, the extreme results are rarely witnessed unless you're shipping art from Arizona to Florida. But really show how much humidity changes can make art and backing buckle. Tape sealing the glass-art-backing package will make a big difference in this problem.
 
….graphite on tracing paper....acrylic glaze....

Hi, FrameArt. Have you framed your graphites with acrylic before? I'd shy away from that, as it's a friable medium, (but that said, I know a pastelist who's done it forever).
 
Shayla- I did immediately express these concerns, but he felt that acrylic was the only safe way to ship these overseas (not that he has before). I know a few of my photographers that frame with glass ship large numbers in crates across the country for shows; some use Optium $. I did not feel I hand enough experience with international shipping to encourage this large group would be safe behind glass. Is that what you would have recommended? Any experience here?
Greg- Thanks for further explanation, I was scanning pdf's quick; love the tests.
 
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