Cyclical non-inking of plate
Hello, I’m new to letterpress on a platen press and just fixed up a Craftsmen Superior Press. I have new rollers and trucks and just started with a boxcar base. I also taped my rails so the rollers are type high.
The other day while printing things were going smoothly execpt for the ocassional white spot while printing. I would print 10 to 15 fine and then for about 5 prints part of the plate would not ink. This happened on two different plates, always in the same place.
I’m printing with rubber based inks on lettra paper. I made a make ready and did find that that particular area need a greater impression anyway. Any ideas of why this would happen in a cyclical fashion? Thanks!
What are you using to clean your ink disk? Any chance there is a residue?
I just have blanket wash right now. The thing is it happened in the same place with two different colors.
it could be your rollers aren’t hitting the type quite hard enough, put a piece of copy paper behind the chase and see itf it helps, it will add impression by doing this so you might want to take a piece of packing out from under your top sheet. Good Luck Dick G.
It could be that one roller is just a bit out of round. To find out, print until the non-inking appears then turn one roller at least a quarter turn. If that doesn’t work, turn the other roller. If the problem persists, then the problem isn’t in the rollers. The easiest solution is to back up the form with a sheet of paper (or two or….). Make sure to compensate for this by pulling sheets from your packing. If you are running polymer plates—this may affect your inking. In any instance, it would be good to have a roller gauge to ascertain that your rails are not too high.
It could be that one roller is just a bit out of round. To find out, print until the non-inking appears then turn one roller at least a quarter turn. If that doesn’t work, turn the other roller. If the problem persists, then the problem isn’t in the rollers. The easiest solution is to back up the form with a sheet of paper (or two or….). Make sure to compensate for this by pulling sheets from your packing. If you are running polymer plates—this may affect your inking. In any instance, it would be good to have a roller gauge to ascertain that your rails are not too high.