lamination peeling off

the lamination of the cover of a South African pressing is starting to peel off. This is typical for the 70's pressing coming out of that country. Nothing too serious yet, but in time the lamination will peel off more and damage the art work.

Any tips to restore the cover without having to peel off the lamination completely?

My first idea was to spray glue on the cover between lamination and then iron the surface with a soft cloth at very modest temperature. Not sure if this will work or destroy the lamination though.

Any tips are appreciated. Cheers

What do you mean by cover lamination? Do you have a picture?

Laminate is silicone, applied to the paper on top of the ink before going through the oven in the printing process. I really don't think there is much you can do about it peeling off. Leave it alone.

peeling off is the last option as I am pretty sure it will damage the art work. Thanks for the info on what laminate is

Best way to preserve it get some sort of laquar spray (clear) in a can from your local DIY or Art shop then spray over it to preserve. Or it may look horrible prob better idea buy a sheet of sticky back clear PVC (make sure not orange peel, USE glass clear only) cut to shape of cover and stick on top it will hold all the cracking together least till that top PVC sheet crack lol (prob another 20 years).
Cheers DJKIDC

the laquer spray seems like a good idea. I never thought about that as a possible solution myself. Will try it out on a worthless peeling cover before I hit the right one.

thanks DJKIDC for this valuable tip!

Like your mama used to say when she caught you picking scabs. Leave it alone! Put whole thing in a poly sleeve and forget it. Those 'clarifoil' 60s/70s ones; carefully trim off the bits that have come away (scalpel/stanley knife) being careful not to cut into the card of sleeve) then put in a poly outer. (PVC has been reported to cause stains on vinyl and sleeves for long-term storage). Don't be tempted to pull peeling flaps further, they will bring the print off. If you must fanny about with it, just trim up to the line with a a scalpel. There's nothing in a can on the market that will invisibly 're-laminate' your sleeve. I have a lot of experience with vinyl adhesives and can't recommend applying clear self-adhesive vinyl to cardboard. Use of soapy water would be required to ensure a flat, bubble-free finish (cardboard and soapy water don't go well together). Learn to love it as it is. Clarifoil have a lot to answer for! Most printers back in the 60s/70s would have used ordinary wood varnish to gloss their jobs.

I have this same problem on some of my records. Soulboy1975 might have given the best answer. But you see, probably like many of you, I can't simply watch something that is valued to me go on deteriorating and remain imive about that.
Now, I've seen something on the Internet that MIGHT be a solution and I'm thinking about go on deep on that as soon as I have some spare time.
It's called LIQUID GLASS. Google it and you'll have plenty of information and videos about it. As I said, I'm THINKING about trying it. I haven't done it yet.
If you decide to try, please let us know about it.
Good luck.

To quote "Most printers back in the 60s/70s would have used ordinary wood varnish to gloss their jobs."- This is not true silicone is what is used to laminate paper. The problem is the paper shrinks over time especially in very dry environments. Like I stated previously there is very little that can be done other than keep them in as controlled enviroment as possible away from dry heat.

I tried to repair the peeled off lamination with hairspray today and it worked.
I put the fluid on the lamination surface that was peeled off and pressed the lamination on the cover and ... it glued together.
Some parts of the lamination finally showed some tiny bubbles but in general it showed a satisfying result. The lamination didn't become milky what can happen if you work with glue.
So hairspray is the better method IMO.

I tried to fix my copy of Ferrante & Teicher Heavenly Sounds In Hi-Fi and the results were so unfortunate I couldn't stand to look at it and ended up buying a poor quality record to get a nice replacement sleeve. Personally I would just put the sleeve in a crystal outer sleeve which will stabilize things and not risk making it worse by attempting to fix it.

Quael had a very good tip with the hairspray. I tried to repair a few covers using this method
and it worked wonders! After spraying I immediately pressed out some tiny airbubbles with a soft cloth
and dried the sprayed surfaces before putting back the cover in a pvc sleeve.
The lamination is now as tight as ever and no signs of milky residue or whatever have formed.
Great tip!!

would anyone of you who used hairspray have look at the longterm effect?
would be nice to know if it causes longterme effects after 2 or 3 years.
best. m

the hairspray works wonders. I can tell from experience.
It is necessary to spray not too close on the surfaces and directed towards
clean surfaces. Then press with a soft cloth and wipe until all creases/bubbles
are out. Let dry.
Looks great! And no loosening after that treatment.
Quael mentioned that trick and I'm very happy he did.

I was confronted by the same problem last week. A mint boxset from 1980 had lamination which started to "bubble": not yet peel off, but when I was wiping the dirt off, there was a large bubble of air between the lamination and the cardboard.

What I effectively did was wiping it thoroughly with a lot of lighter fuel. It filled the air-filled bubbles and looks quite decent again.

Hi I'm still not sure if that might cause long term side effects like corrosion with the print etc.
Would be ok to try it with a cheap record but not with treasures without knowing more about it...

A long time since anyone posted but I have successfully soaked a sleeve in boiling water to get all the Clarifoil laminate to peel off, then I re-sized the sleeve with Methylcellulose and, once it was dry, covered it in adhesive plastic film. It worked a treat and looked pretty convincingly like an original laminated sleeve. I've done this kind of thing with books - I do a bit of binding/restoration as a hobby - but it was my first time with an LP sleeve.

claws-on
A long time since anyone posted but I have successfully soaked a sleeve in boiling water to get all the Clarifoil laminate to peel off, then I re-sized the sleeve with Methylcellulose and, once it was dry, covered it in adhesive plastic film.

Interesting! What I'm curious about is how you got the sleeve to dry flat after soaking it in water. If you have a way to do that, perhaps it would also work for flattening water damaged sleeves.

I put it between sheets of blotting paper and pressed it between boards with a weight on top until it was dry - a couple of bricks. If I just wanted to flatten a warped sleeve I'd probably lightly dampen it then press as above, I wouldn't use boiling water for that. The one I relaminated I fully opened out and the reglued it, if I wasn't planning to do that I'd put a piece of 2-3mm thcick card inside to stop the spine being crushed. It's the sort of thing I'd do if I'm repairing a book. BUT always test a small area with a cotton bud first, just in case the ink is water soluble. Google paper conservation and repair techniques - anything that works on a book should work on a record sleeve.

Revell a clear (39609) from the model making area ()
Clean the surfaces to be glued, brush them thinly with glue, let them dry and press them together. It may be that the glue creates a white film when applied, which disappears when pressed together. If it's done right, there's almost nothing left to see (Mint Magazin No.14) But the hairspray thing sounds good too ;)