Building a press
I’m pretty new to the world of printing. I can’t really afford many of the “conventional” materials, especially a printing press. To rectify this, I built my own a couple of years ago. It’s a wobbly, barely functional press, but it’s still a press.
Now, I’m interested in building another one in order to rectify the problems with the press I’ve got now. Have any of you done something like this before, and, if so, do you have any tips?
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Hello Simon….
yes, you can indeed build a very functional press. Several presses have been built by folks here at Briar Press. I myself have build a few, and posted their pictures and descriptions. All of mine print very well, and were not very tough to make. Here are a sampling of links to the various discussions:
http://www.briarpress.org/12848
http://www.briarpress.org/33089
http://www.briarpress.org/29301
http://www.briarpress.org/21427
http://briarpress.org/13002
….and these are just a few. Just do a search here and you’ll find a lot of conversations. Also if you go to Wetcanvas.com / printmaking you’ll find several more excellent presses that folks have made.
Essentially, the two best designs for home-made presses are either the Bottle-jack platen, or the Cylinder / Roller presses. there have been a number of screw presses built, too. I tend to prefer the roller-style, but the bottle-jack platen presses also work.
Good luck on your project! just be sure to post pictures and results.
smallpress 1.jpg