9/10/2018 How do I remove dust or dust mites from old books?

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How do I remove dust or dust mites from old books?
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Robin Louden Allergies: How do I minimize dust mites, so I'll stop

Answered Mar 31, 2016 · Upvoted by Belinda Lawrence, former Librarian at Libraries and painfully sneezing every day?
Librarianship (2002-2014)
What are the measures to avoid interaction with
to vacuum the books with a clean upholstery brush, BUT, this has the potential
dust mites almost completely?
to seriously contaminate your vacuum and then spew book-mildew spores out
How do I clean antique books and remove paper
every time you use it ever afterward. I have solved this by having a special, mites?
dedicated, true- HEPA museum vacuum that I only use on books, and can
Can you kill dust mites by running a dehumidifier?
disassemble completely for cleaning. I live with nearly 7,000 books so it's an
important cleaning tool for me, but probably not so important for others. Simple How many dust mites a day do humans swallow?

hand wiping, however, will do as good a job, and leave your vacuum safe. If you How many calories are in a dust mite?
do use a vac, you will need to use it carefully to avoid damaging the books or How do you detect dust mites?
sucking loose pieces of pages or the dust jackets in. (BTW, remove any dust
jackets and treat them separately.) It's also a good idea to wash any brushes and
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dry them completely between days of work, if it extends over more than one day. More Related Questions

But you're not done now. You still need to expose the books to sunlight fora few Question Stats
hours. Of course sunlight can fade bindings, so this has to be controlled
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carefully. But a few hours of good strong sun will do wonders to kill many of the
9,162 Views
remaining spores that you can't see. After the sunbath, and still working outside
Last Asked Feb 22, 2017
on trestle tables covered with clean sheets, I go on to the next phase of the
Edits
cleaning. What I do next is to wipe the covers down with grain alcohol,which will
kill even more of the remaining spores, without in my experience,doing much or
any damage. Obviously, each book has to be carefully tested to make sure the
alcohol won't damage the covers, but I rarely find it does. I know some people
have used propyl (rubbing alcohol), but I've had many more bleeding and
damage problems with that than with grain alcohol. I get grain alcohol (which is
not for consumer sale in NY), by going across state lines and purchasing it from
Vermont State Liquor Stores. (I have been told that in some states in can be
bought in ordinary liquor stores or in pharmacies.) Even there it has become
more difficult to get because it is so damaging to drink. I have to sign a
statement that I am using it for scientific or experimental purposes;I just state I
am using it to clean books. I got the idea of using the grain alcohol from
studying both the solinet and palimpsest preservation boards. They suggested
using cut-up squares of paper towels saturated in grain alcohol and kept in zip-
lock bags. My process is to slice a roll of Select-a-size Bounty in half or thirds and
then use the pieces. I have a small container with a siphoning laboratory top
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9/10/2018 How do I remove dust or dust mites from old books? - Quora

that allows me to just tap and draw up the alcohol. I wipe the entire cover
surface (from spine to edge) discarding the little towels as soon as they look
dirty. (I wind up standing in a little snow storm of squares of discarded towel if
I'm doing a big project outdoors. The alcohol-saturated towels must be
thoroughly air-dried before being discarded in the trash can in order to avoid
spontaneous combustion, so I just drop them to the ground and then collect
them in batches.) After I've done the spine and covers, I open the book and do
the turn-over of the cover, and sometimes the end paper and free fly leaf in the
gutter.
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John Ward, works at Mold Busters

Answered Oct 11, 2017

In my practice they are usually not able to sustain any treatment well enough to
do anything about them. So maybe it would be the best if you just wipe them
with dry mop from time to time and try to keep them in closed shelves.

Most people don’t realize it, but mold in paper is a big problem. It multiplies
quickly and feeds off of cellulose-rich materials like paper. It spreads very fast
and can affect your indoor air quality so my advice would be, if you know you
have some mold on them (take a mold test kit for example) than consider to
discard them.

Here you can see how dust and mold can affect your indoor environment:
Effects of Household Mold on Humans
2.3k Views · View Upvoters · Answer requested by Rakesh Patel

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Jamie Huang
Answered Apr 1

you can use vacuum cleaners with HEPA filter or use special spray to get rid of
them.

For more information:16 Easy Ways to Get Rid of Dust Mites and Get Allergy
Relief | Homelization

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9/10/2018 How do I remove dust or dust mites from old books? - Quora
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Jon Carlson, I've had an allergy to dust since I was a kid.

Answered Dec 31, 2015

I've put books outside in the sun for 30 minutes with the pages fanned out. 
After that I have been able to read the book without my nose running.

However, during the winter in northern climates there is either little sun or
there is snow everywhere and I don't want to leave the book in the snow.

I heard once that there are sprays used by old book-dealers, but I haven't yet
found them on the internet.  I've only found allergy prays for pets which I'd
rather not use on a book without hearing others say they've done it.

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Maud Guckin
Answered Jan 9, 2016

For cleaning books it is needed vacuum. It can not wash by water or using any
chemical washing agent. Low pressure of air can remove dirty and dust from old
books. Carpet Cleaning

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Richard Johnson, studies Small Businesses at Fluorine (2016)

Answered Nov 18, 2016

I just took my vacuum cleaner and start to clean all my books very carefully,
then i buy the wipes and clean witht hem too for better effect! This way i find
here How to get rid of dust mites in 5 steps ! I just read the article! Good luck
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Betsy Farmer, Avocate of natural cleaning products

Answered Mar 26, 2016

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9/10/2018 How do I remove dust or dust mites from old books? - Quora

Try Airbiotics on them! It works to eliminate dust mites because it works on the
microscopic level where dust mites thrive. They use Probiotics in the formula so
breathing in this formula is actually good for you and will improve your indoor
air quality. If you're still looking for some relief here's a link
https://www.airbioticsusa.com/pa...

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Gong Cheng, Entrepreneur, lives in Seattle.

Answered Feb 3, 2016

It depends on how many books you need to process. If you only have one book,
you can try to blow the book using the hair drier for 5-10 minutes.
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