Reverse bevel for a double mount

[Judders]

Doing a double mount for a pastel, although I shall be putting a spacer under, I am also cutting the mounts reverse bevel to catch residual dust. Having difficulty in cutting the bottom mount. Using my Keencut mount cutter I have increased the blade depth but it is not cutting through the board of the bottom mount. So the blade depth has to be more and more! Is there an easier way. Not sure about cutting them separately, as not easy to ensure the margins are equal all round. Any tips to help, or comments. Its just a fag having to alter the blade depth every time!

[John Ranes II, CPF, GCF]

Hi Judders,

Cutting reverse bevels on our Valiani CMC is a "Slam Dunk"...that's American for a sure thing! Just turning the mount board over and you've got it - We honestly now sell reverse bevels more commonly because of the ease in producing them with a CMC. Unfortunately that doesn't help you - but there are a couple of techniques that I might suggest for owner of professional table top mount cutters...

One method is to cut the openings separately. But to assure alignment, instead of cutting the bottom mount slightly smaller, cut the outside dimensions of the two boards while they are temporarily adhered to each other.

• Cut two blank boards slightly larger than your desired overall size (2-3cm is all).
• Determine where the opening is located and place 4-5 small dabs of ATG in the center area to temporarily hold the boards together.
• On a flat surface, align one edge of the two boards so that the are perfectly on top of each other and squeeze the two together. You now have one edge in agreement.
• Using a Wall Cutter or Guillotine cutter, trim and cut to size the remaining three sides to the desired outside dimension cutting both layers at the same time - This is the best way to assure that they are identical to each other.
• Cutting from the face (top) paper side pencil the corners lightly and cut from point to point (with no overcut), then carefully separate the two boards. The window will not pop out, so pull them apart slowly and trim out the corners carefully by hand (You will be trimming the material underneath the surface paper).
• Place the bottom mount into the cutter and repeat (pencil corners - cut point to point and trim)
• Re-align the two boards back together and they should match up perfectly as you were able to use the GUIDE on our mount cutter to assure parallel openings.

There are other ways used as work-arounds, but this technique above tends to produce the best results. Cutting reverse bevels from the top side of the mount, is a preferred method for inserting fillets here, BTW.

I hope this is helpful.

John

[Judders]

Hi John,

Thanks for your answer. I had to read it a few times to digest! So I understand your method of achieving two identical size boards by trimming the three sides after aligning the one edge and trimming the other three. Not sure why I need the pencil marks instead of using stop guides, is this to avoid overcuts, I think it is the reason I am getting overcuts using the stops on my mount cutter. Having the two pieces of board perfectly trimmed to be duplicates is the key. I will give it a try. It is an ingenious method.

[prospero]

Try this....

Cut the mount as per usual - stick the slightly undersize under board to the back of the top mount and tack back the dropout.

Then reset the guide but add 3mm to the margin. Instead of cutting, draw a pencil line - crossing the corners a bit.

Take off the margin guide bar. Put the mount back the wrong way round, with the dropout part to the left of the cutter bar.

Eyeball the blade and jiggle things about so it runs dead along the pencil line. Set the start/end stops +2mm.

Make the cut and repeat for the other three sides.


Might be wise to try it on a small test mount first to fine tune the settings.

[Roboframer]

I've read both how-to's above and am struggling - I'm sure if I could watch both methods I'd get it.

I don't have a video for my method but hopefully the explanation is easier; this is how I do it on a keencut ultimat gold .........................

When cutting a mount in the usual way, face down, there has to be overcuts on the back, otherwise the fall out ... wouldn't!

The overcut at the start of cut is longer than the overcut at the end of cut, measure the overcuts.

Adjust the stops accordingly so there is no overcut whatsoever, in fact aim for minute UNDERcuts to be safe and cut face up.

Finish the cuts by inserting a blade at a shallow angle to make those overcuts at the back.

For a double mount this could probably be done with two boards stuck together - I've never tried, I'd just do them individually and eyeball them when fixing together.

Thing is though, for pastels, I wouldn't do that, it doesn't look too good; I'd rev bev the bottom mount, possibly space that away from the artwork by one mount thickness and then cut the top mount with a bevel but space that away from the bottom mount by 3mm or so.

It would depend on the pastel itself though, there would have to be evidence of it being very loose to have to go to all that bother. Good artists use paper with a good 'tooth' and press the pastel in to it - bad artists use a can of fixative per square foot!

Good and bad artists refer to framer-friendliness - unfortunately some very good artists use some terrible methods and mediums.

.

[John Ranes II, CPF, GCF]

...So I understand your method of achieving two identical size boards by trimming the three sides after aligning the one edge and trimming the other three. Not sure why I need the pencil marks instead of using stop guides, is this to avoid overcuts....

Judders,

When you cut the opening, you are cutting with the Face side up....therefore, measuring stops really don't function, as there is NO overcut... you cut from point to point and trim afterwards.

Overcuts exist only on manual mat cutters when cutting from the reverse side to allow for the entrance of the blade on one end, and the angle of the blade on the other end of the cut.

...Adjust the stops accordingly so there is no overcut whatsoever, in fact aim for minute UNDERcuts to be safe and cut face up.

Finish the cuts by inserting a blade at a shallow angle to make those overcuts at the back.

The above technique shared by John Turner also works, but does require re-calibrating your stops twice...once to achieve ZERO overcut and then to readjust to bring them back to standard overcut.


John

[Roboframer]

No, I used this method for years and wouldn't have gone to all that bother. I said set the stops accordingly, not recalibrate.

[Judders]

Wow, started a discussion on this! Really appreciate your replies. Roboframer has the more straightforward approach, but glad of all the tips.
Many thanks from 'Judders'

[prospero]

As a footnote I would like to echo Robo's sentiments. Why bother?

There are all sorts of cunning methods to catch loose particles and some of them work - to a point.
The fact is that however many bits drop into the little catching pits there will always be one that sneaks
around the front and spoils it. And engineering a rev bev on the bottom layer of a double mount
will still leave a neat channel where the reveal of the mount is. You can't rely on bits dropping straight
down and disappearing.

My method with pastels is to give them a good shake over a white surface. When bits stop dropping - put it in the frame.
Even then there will be one bit that drops off later. Sounds crude, but my thinking is that if some pigment is doomed to
come off it may as well come off sooner than later.
It's a pastel. That what pastels do.

[John Ranes II, CPF, GCF]

No, I used this method for years and wouldn't have gone to all that bother. I said set the stops accordingly, not recalibrate.

Unless I am missing something, I believe I meant the same thing: Re-calibrate = set the stops accordingly. I believe that we are doing the same thing. The only difference is that I cut by eye and with no overcut, it is quite simply. We are both trimming out the opening afterwards.

They would still have to be "Re-set" when you moved onto cutting mat blanks from the reverse side with your standard overcuts.

As to using Reverse Bevel mounts for the simple purpose of catching debris from Pastels, then indeed the framer can do other things, like add a spacer or floater in between mats which will also accomplish this task. Pastels do have a tendency to drop debris no matter what precautions are taken.

Sometimes a Reverse bevel simply looks better and create better design, especially if the white bevel exceeds the contrast level within the artwork, so being able to produce them accurately is an important skill set.

John

[IFGL]

I agree with John!

[Roboframer]

Unless I am missing something, I believe I meant the same thing: Re-calibrate = set the stops accordingly. I believe that we are doing the same thing. The only difference is that I cut by eye and with no overcut, it is quite simply. We are both trimming out the opening afterwards.

They would still have to be "Re-set" when you moved onto cutting mat blanks from the reverse side with your standard overcuts.

If you cut an 80mm wide mount and the next mount you cut is 76mm wide you do not recalibrate the machine stops, you just reset them. recalibration of the keencut ultimat in my book means moving the scales to the stops or, in the case of the keencut ultimat gold or futura, using the stop dials IOW a fix for under/overcuts on normal bevels - you can do that for rev bevs of course and then recalibrate for normal bevels, if you are a silly billy.

The method I use uses the stops, no eyeballing required so I'd say that's an advantage but what works for anyone, works. This works for me - and is easy to get your head around.

[kartoffelngeist]

I've never come across a reverse bevel on a mount before, is it a fairly common thing to do?

[prospero]

I very rarely do them. Sometimes on a mount with a fillet where you want the board surface to go right up to
the fillet with no gap. Even with fillets I tend to do a std bevel as I like the gap. And I like to sink the fillet
down a bit so it doesn't touch the glass. But that's just me.

[Roboframer]

We do them regularly, mainly for pastels & mount slips, but with a CMC all we have to do is put the board in upside down.

[David McCormack]

I do them for mount slips/fillets but am happier when not doing them! No cmc here

DSC-0686.jpg (217.79 KiB) Viewed 10506 times

[John Ranes II, CPF, GCF]

We do them regularly, mainly for pastels & mount slips, but with a CMC all we have to do is put the board in upside down.

Totally concur with Robo-John on useage... with the Valiani CMC, we are probably more prone to use them than previously, especially where design is a concern. As we use 100% Conservation Grade mounts, the white bevel too often exceeds the contrast range of the image being framed. That is a perfect time to simple cut a reverse bevel.

I would estimate that we do reverse bevels almost 30% of the time.

John