The BookFactory Engineering Notebook

by Steve on April 18, 2012

The folks at BookFactory.com were generous enough to send me a sample of their hardcover engineering notebook for review, and I’ve had a chance to use it for a while. I’ll compare it to the Leuchtturm1917 book I’ve been using as a journal for a while now, since that’s the only other large book I’ve used in the past few years.

I’m using it to hold notes for a business research project, and so far it’s been a good book.

A half-filled Leuchtturm1917 Master size book shows some bag wear

Cover thickness compared - BookFactory on top

I love the heavy, stiff covers. This is one area where the European competition is weak. Is a smaller book it’s not a big deal, but with a full size book it’s critical that the covers be thick and strong enough to support being written on. You can see the Leuchtturm1917 A4 size book I’m using is starting to get bent, and also how much thicker the BookFactory cover is.

8×10 is a nice size. Actually 8.25 x 10.25, but big enough to have the big-book feel without the slightly too-big hassle that can come with A4+ size Master books. For example, the RedOxx Gator bag I’m thinking of getting would fit the BookFactory book no problem, but is actually 3/8″ shorter than the Leuchtturm1917 master dots. The LT will probably fit if angled a bit, but I’d rather have something that fits easily. Many bags I own were designed around fitting a letter size sheet of paper or not, and the BookFactory book fits just under that threshold where the Master is a tight fit.

Comparison of tables of contents. Leuchtturm1917 on top. Note the date column on the BookFactory book.

The table of contents is the best I’ve seen. Having one entry per page makes it easy to jot down what’s there. For me this makes the difference between a table of contents that gets used, and one that doesn’t. I can deal with the task of summarizing what’s on a page in a few sentences. I have a hard time deciding when a particular entry is important enough to warrant using up one of a limited number of TOC entries. Making it even better is the date column. Many times I know what date I’m looking for, and scanning down the TOC to find that date would be easy.

The paper is white and thick enough. I haven’t tested it extensively with fountain pens, but it feels more like 100gsm than 80gsm to me. About the same as the Leuchtturm1917, and performs the same. I’m not a heavy fountain pen user and most of mine are fine, fairly dry writers, so bleed and so on aren’t an issue for me.

You can see the Leuchtturm1917 page numbers are much less obtrusive

The printing is toner based and is very bold and dark. I imagine this is to ensure it comes through on photocopies, but it makes me feel like I’m filling out a form. I much prefer the gray printing in Leuchtturm1917 books. You can see the difference in the page numbers.

The writing area is framed, which is strange. I’m used to grid and dots books with no margins, so having a window to write in does provide some structure. In the other hand, there’s a half inch of wasted space all around the sides. The spot at the top to write the “continued from” page number, and the spot at the bottom for the “continued to” page number are handy. I know I could just write it on any page, but the space is nice to have. It will sound a little silly, but the form at the bottom with date and signature and witness blocks makes me feel like what I’m writing is important. Don’t know if I’ll ever use them.

Flysheet reinforced with fabric tape

Fly sheet also stitched

Last but not least, the construction of the book is very sturdy. The book block itself is fastened securely to the fly sheet via tape, and the end sheets are also stitched. This book should survive just about any reasonable use, and the heavy covers will make it a lot more durable in the bag.

Conclusions

The BookFactory engineering notebook has been refined to suit a particular purpose over a long period of time and it shows. Whether or not it would make good place to record thoughts depends on what one plans to do with those thoughts. I find the table of contents very attractive, but the page design distracting for anything but straight writing. I feel too much space is wasted, and I don’t care for the ruling. Is the table of contents good enough to overlook the rest? Probably not for a journal, but as a notebook for any purpose where sketching isn’t likely to be involved I think it would be my first choice.

So what would make this the perfect journal? Basically, the covers and construction and table of contents of the BookFactory with the page design of the Leuchtturm1917. Specifically:

  1. Pages with 5mm dot grid in gray/halftone, without the border – have the dot grid overlap all edges.
  2. Unobtrusive page numbers in the upper outside corners, also in gray/halftone.
  3. Include the “Continued from page:” and “Continued to page:” entries in gray/halftone, in the upper left and lower right corners, respectively.
  4. BookFactory style table of contents, with one entry per page and a date column.
  5. 300+ pages, so I have more history with me.

I’ve spoken to the folks at BookFactory about creating a new version with some of these features, and it’s possible. The challenge of course is meeting minimum order requirements. The good news is that I don’t need to order hundreds – fifty would be enough.

Would you be interested in a book described above? Would you rather have dot grid pages or plain pages?

{ 8 comments }

The Vacation Satchel: What I Brought

by Steve on April 16, 2012

A short while ago I posed the question about what to bring on vacation, and what to bring it in. We got back from our trip to Florida on Saturday morning, and here’s how it turned out.

I brought:

Leuchtturm1917 Master Dots notebook – what got used. This is my main journal, and it was where I wrote everything. Carrying the book didn’t prove to be as much as a pain as I thought it might be – more on that later. I wrote about what we did, things to improve for next time, a battery wiring diagram for my father-in-law’s golf cart, a few sketches, and so on. I filled thirteen A4 pages.

Home made leather notebook – didn’t make it out of the bag. I don’t know why, but I’m just not getting into using this book.

Stories Of A Father And His Girls notebook – didn’t make it out of the bag. This was a gift from my wife, and I had great hopes of filling this one with stories of the trip, but I realize now it needs to be written in after a bit of contemplation.

Stillman and Birn Epsilon 5×8 notebook – did a very brief watercolor in it. Could have stayed at home. I brought it specifically to draw in, but I realize now that I draw to record what is happening, which needs to be in the journal.

BookFactory pocket notebook – carried it a few times, but never used it. It’s my favorite small notebook because of the table of contents, but every time I went to go use it I ended up using the journal.

Sakura Koi 12-color pocket watercolor set – used once. I think I will leave this at home in the future, at least until I know better what to do with it.

Nomadic pencil case with a variety of pencils and pens. Could have left most of it at home, along with the case. Partly because the backpack I took didn’t have room for it, and partly because I just didn’t need that many options. I ended up using my yellow Caran d’Ache 849 with a CdA blue medium cartridge, and the Kuru Toga mechanical pencil.

I ended up using a daypack that was part of a Eagle Creak solo journey  backpack combination, and while a daypack is nice I think I will be upgrading to a RedOxx Gator in the very near future.

How did it work out?

I wanted everything in one book. Every time I thought about writing in another book I felt like I was breaking the rules. I’ve had no trouble writing in other books in the past, but  I have noticed I have this feeling more often since I started using a larger book as my journal. It’s also that when looking back on the trip it’s nice to have everything together.

Wind, sand, and humidity mess with notebooks. The sand gets between the pages and makes the writing surface uneven. The wind makes holding the book open and writing in it a challenge, even with the band;  Wind is actually a good reason to have a band on a large book. The humidity made the pages wavy.

Sand actually jammed the 849′s pusher mechanism, but was cleared easily. I’d thought the 849 would be an ideal pen on the beach because the mechanism is more accessible than the Parker Jotter, but it actually jammed a few times. Not a big deal, and I never used the Jotter so I can’t say it would have been more reliable.

The thin cover of the Leuchtturm1917 was a bit of a liability. When carrying it in a briefcase with files and other similar objects the thin cover is not really a problem. But when the book is the largest thing in the back, and it’s sharing the bag with a camera, clothing, and whatever else it didn’t fair so well. As you can see it’s starting to get misshapen. If I was normally carrying this book the way I do on vacation, I’m sure it would be a pretty ratty looking mess before long. Writing at home and at work usually means writing at a table. Writing when traveling means half the time the book is in my lap, or some other less than fully supported situation. This really needs the kind of cover thickness that BookFactory and Stillman and Birn provide.

A big book was fine in the car and most other places. I’d worried that it would be harder to write in, or would be harder to get into a comfortable position, but it was just as usable as the 5×8 books I was used to carrying. The only time I felt the larger book was a problem was in the wind – those big pages were hard to hold down with my forearm and I eventually gave up, although a few binder clips would have worked ok. I just didn’t feel like digging them out of the bag. I think the thicker paper of a Stillman and Birn might be more wind resistant, but then I’d give up ruling and page numbers .

What I’ll Bring Next time:

Main notebook. It might be another Leuchtturm Master Dots, or maybe something else. I’m thinking a custom version of the BookFactory lab notebook might be on the horizon – more on that later. Regardless, I will use something large enough that I don’t hesitate making notes.

Maybe a sketchbook, with the purpose of filling it with bad sketches. I noticed that many times I hesitated to sketch because I didn’t want to fill up my journal with aborted sketch attempts. Maybe the solution is to carry a book specifically to fill in with the bad drawings one needs to make before the good ones become more frequent. Maybe I just need to get over the fear that someone will walk up to see what ‘the artist’ is drawing, only to see the pathetic graphical train wreck that is unfolding on my page 8-)

A mechanical pencil, with a few spare leads. I took the Kuru Toga, but really any decent pencil would do.

A click eraser. Didn’t need anything bigger, but I wouldn’t depend on the stubby thing that comes on most mechanicals.

A ballpoint pen, with a spare – both taking the same cartridge. I think next time it will be a pair of Caran d’Ache 849′s, maybe in different colors or point sizes. Having two functioning pens is a good idea with kids, because as soon as one wants to draw, another does. If I didn’t have kids, I might bring something more refined, but when a hungry, tired kid wants to draw on a paper restaurant placemat (or glossy brochure, or whatever is available for them to write on) while waiting for dinner to come, I want to hand them something that works, won’t break, and won’t write through to the table(cloth) underneath. That’s a ballpoint.

 

{ 0 comments }

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →