Availability of Letterpress Gauge Pins
Recently a small proof press and a handful of printing accoutrements were offered for sale on Facebook for $50. The listing included two boxes of Kort Gauge pins. One ensuing comment said, “the gauge pins alone are worth $50.” Another said, “Yes they are made from ‘unobtainium’.”
The scarcity of good affordable gauge pins has been a problem for us letterpress printers for quite a while. When you can find some for sale, they are particularly expensive.
Over two years ago I started a quest to address this problem. As you can see from the pictures in this post, I went through about 15 iterations trying to design and produce an “easy-to-use,” durable, and inexpensive gauge pin. I wanted to develop something that would avoid the significant upfront costs of having machine dies made.
Working with sources in Iowa, North Carolina, Indiana, New York and Poland, I tried creating something using 3D printing so that testing could be done without a high initial cost. I found making these from plastic with 3D printing was far tougher than I imagined.
Nearly a year ago I was able to market the first 3D version called Paw-Claws. That whole initial run sold out the in less than 2 weeks. Unfortunately, the source was unreliable and the product was too fragile.
After many more iterations, and unavoidable significant upfront costs, the new metal Paw-Claws are ready for sale. They are easy to use, functional, durable and affordable.
Initial feedback is I “stuck the landing.”
The video on my website shows how to use them and how quickly you can register your work.
There is a classified listing here on Briarpress and you can see them on my website
SouthpawPrinters.com
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I love what you have accomplished here, I saw your post on facebook, and they are definitely something I will be buying, this solves a huge void in the letterpress tools and accessories that has been there for quite sometime. Thank you for such a commendable job. Congratulations hope that people appreciate this because to be in 2024 and to have a new design of gauge pins it’s just absolutely amazing.
Thank you for taking the time to experiment! I’ve been keeping an eye on your progress
A few weeks ago I posted this piece about my quest to come up with a replacement for the difficult to find letterpress gauge pins.
Since then a number of folks have said the pictures I’d posted give the wrong impression,(no pun intended) of what the actual Paw-Claws look like. So I am posting these pictures. Thanks, if you’d like to see the video of how they are used go to my website SouthpawPrinters.com
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Steve worked on the Paws Claws for years and I had the pleasure of providing feedback on some of the earlier iterations. It was so cool to watch these take shape. The final result is a great solution to a vexing problem. Thanks, Steve!
The new Paw Claws are great. I got an earlier version that didn’t hold up. Steve sent on the new metal ones. They are easy to set up and hold well. We’ve been using homemade adhesive gauge pins in the group shop at Shelburne Museum; they were hard to set properly and hard to feed. These are the answer for us.