More than one person asked me what kind of tape we use to do in-house binding.
We use Scotch tapes numbers 845 and 371. 845 is also called Book Tape. We have a
3M tape dispenser that will hold one roll of each side by side. Usually the
heavier tape (845) is used to create a "spine" for the volume and the lighter
tape (371) is used between each issue. This is especially good for volumes that
we are holding only until the blackout periods of the electronic versions are
past, because these volumes will be recycled once our electronic versions are
available.

As for the incomplete volumes, the tape does make it easy to fill in missing
issues, but preservation issues . . . might be issues. For the costs saved we
have made the decision to reduce bindery binding to art journals only, but that
is certainly a trade-off we made.

Liz Kent
Reference & Electronic Resources Librarian
Sweet Briar College