Home Made Chase
Re thickness of chase frame material, a reasonable rule of thumb, would be to see the depth/thickness of Cornerstone, (aluminium), Resolite or Paxolin furniture, generally these tend to be, close to the height of standard quoins, implying that this would be a good MINIMUM thickness and ONLY up to the thickness that would clear the rollers!!! Follows a few suggestions for D.I.Y.ers, as an esteemed buddy has implied, every retro (or would be) letterpress printer, should have a friendly engineer handy, but in the real world this may not always be possible, hence “1” make some delicate enquiries, within possibly the B.P.circle and see if any body, has retained a rack of steel interlocking furniture, (normally 24 point thick graduated from 18 ems to possibly 40 ems) which would have been used, for example, as a furniture saving device, inside the 2 colour border for a certificate, interlocked, stronger than any multiple of quoins!!!or the chase? If BIG IF admittedly, such were still lurking, unused, unloved and negotiable, with a little help, from, just a reasonably proficient welder, think of the variety of chases that could be manufactured?? O.K. this is in essence the principle, so small pegs on either side for locaters or small ramps top and bottom for clamps, are not exactly, space age, i.e.ordinary hand held electric drill and hand file, surely, well below the relative expertise required to lock up a forme, to lift all the leads and spaces!!! Especially if one hasent grasped the principle of 1 point squeeze per 10ems of typeseting???>>>”2” Assuming that your cutting formes are manufactured basically the same as in U.K. and are normally only of sufficient height to accomodate cutting. creasing.and perforating rule, by implication and at 10 ply, will make chases, that easily stand table top machine pressure!!! Once again not exactly high tech, especially in the print trade, most everybody seems to have access to an accurate table saw, for the outside parameter of the chase and the inside, after determining, the wall thickness, 4 (four) holes at the internal corners, with the electric drill, reasonably straight lines/cuts with D.I.Y. jigsaw, slightly under sized, to allow for truing up, in the bench vice, by using the jaws with your chase clamped in, and a little delicate filing, or rasp (for wood) and file, the jaws will not let you get anything, other than accuracy, to within 2/3 thicknesses of stock.! >> If of course inbuilt ramps, for clamping into machine, are required no problem, small rebates with the aforementioned rasp and file, should be easy, if it should be felt, that as clamping ramps may detract, from the overall strength of the chase forward planning would involve making the section, top and or bottom slightly thicker, as learned friends have already posted expecting more than I believe 60/70% overall impressionable print area is expecting more than the inbuilt capabilities, will not seriously effect your internal chase capacity!! Should the machine have only slots in the bed, for the chase to drop into downwards, for location, construct the chase with an overall size, side to side, by less than the thickness of 2 pieces of steel strip 1/16 of an inch for example, incorporating 2 tiny pegs incorporated in the steel strips, to locate the chase within the bed, and then when correct alignment is checked out, small screws, countersunk into the steel strips to retain. HOPEFULLY all Junior School type technology!!!??? Or “3” on the basis that you seem to be well blessed with live steam enthusiasts, building scale models in home workshops, with possibly only a lathe and small milling machine, just possibly suggest that, with such equipment and sufficient bribery and corruption, to help their fighting funds, by acquisition of 1 suitable piece of steel they could manufacture “RUSSIAN DOLL” style chases i.e. progressively smaller to suit several machines, at hopefully lot less than normal suppliers!! and tailor made!! with out the “of course Sir We will have to jig up for a One Off!!!” at telephone figure charges,
Mick,
You keep replying to existing threads by creating new ones. It’s terribly confusing.
We are printers, we are confused anyway.
Paragraph breaks would increase the readability of your thread.
Keelan and Cmg, thank you for your input.>>>I take it as at least a partial success. >>>Your replies indicate that you have tried to asses the drift of my post,>>>and as one who has actually been hands on, since 1954, I feel that I May just know!!!>>>Metaphorically step back and take an in depth look at some previous posts, going back even a few weeks,>>> some running at 15, 20, 25 entries, more and counting,>>>95% completely irrelevant to the original post,>>>and then Surprise, Surprise,>>>within hours a new keen disciple has to post again,>>>questions that have already been answered, many times, but are buried deep in the archives.>>>What chance for a genuine, keen, learner to navigate that minefield,>>>and as The Site has XX,XXX members/contributors Worldwide, allegedly, >>>what help is all the one upmanship and backbiting,??which presumably belongs on a social networking site,>>>Apologies, as I have appeared to ramble in a haphazard way,>>>but I sincerely believe, that there is a lot of useful junk, in my head, >>>which may yet be of interest, to New Learners.>>>Apologies, once more,>>>and I rest my case, Your Honour.>>>Mick
Mick, i think there is a lot of useful junk in that head that even some old timer learners can benefit from, keep posting, love your posts, some day i just might swim across the big pond and look you up. Dick G.
Mick… Perhaps this link to a post that I made couple years ago can help illustrate the short story you wrote. This furniture was patented and made by Challenge in 1912, but I do not know for how long. The “Challenge” furniture locks up tightly due to it’s size where-as the smaller, thinner notched metal furniture you mention would lend itself to pinning or welding much easier and could also be used in smaller table top presses. The interchangeable combinations are what make the concept so ideal and lend themselves to imprint changes and pull-outs when used with-in larger chases.
http://www.briarpress.org/23287
B.B. Sincerly, thank you for your tutorial, I fully concede that, although I comprehend the principles,>> as in my humble efforts,>> I still love the idea of updates, because as My ex wife, And Peter, will verify,>>>there is probably too much Lead, Tin, Antimony and Mercury inside me crowding out the finer points!!!>>>but if the by product helps the new ones to assimilate some info, I/We can (possibly) be seen as useful,>>Thanks again!!!!>>>And another thing,>>>DICK, yes THE Dick, “G” dont just keep threatening this trip across “The Pond” get your 35 foot Canoe down from the roof of the Barn, Print Shop (yours) >>>fix yourself up with, at very least 50 H.P. Evinrude, Mercury, Volvo Penta or similar, Outboard, strap it on and put the Peddle to the Metal.>>>Bring your archive Head with you,>>>because its a racing certainty there will be many Old and Young!!!>>> that would welcome your face to face info,>>>I for one would love you to “Rattle My Cage” eyeball to eyeball.>>>And to all, whatever moves your impressions counter fastest, apologies, thanks and regards, Mick (D.O.F).