Taking Care of Lil Bro

I should be posting about our trip to Germany. Instead, the plethora of photos has me stalled in that department.

Instead, I offer up The Boys again. Cicero takes good care of his Lil Bro Phidian, never mind that Phidian outgrew him in his first year.

These two shots were taken in my lap, with minimal lighting, with my iPhone. The best camera you have is the one you have WITH you!

I love the look of complete trust here.












A late evening bawth is the best kind. Phidian hardly bothers to wake up.

It Keeps On Giving

      Have you ever heard of Cascarones? They are hollowed-out eggs, filled with confetti, to smash on friends' heads during a Fiesta like we have in Santa Barbara. They are the gift that keeps on giving. For at least six months after the city-wide party, you find confetti in your car, your clothing, your house, your driveway. At least if you have friends.
      Yesterday I put away the small tote bag I usually carry during Fiesta. In it, I found a baggie with some confetti and a lone cascarone left over from the parade. I placed the baggie on the table and forgot about it.
      Wrong move. Today, the boys found it. They often perch on the pew and nose around at things on the table. When I emerged triumphant from the sewing room, I was greeted by signs the boys had experienced their own Fiesta while I was sewing.
       Exhibit A (Phidian, skulking)

Annnnd Exhibit B (Cicero, looking innocent)

Management makes no assumptions about the relative guilt or lack thereof of individual suspects. All parties involved have been thoroughly laughed at and found. . . . . . purring!

The Great Roller Fiasco

I had to try to print the last run for a calendar page job today, despite the oddly rising middle roller on my C&P.

Things were going along fairly well for awhile, but I noticed I seemed to be picking off quite a few hickeys. I stopped a couple of times to do that, making sure the inked disk was free of lumps before proceeding. I blamed the ink, which I've had for a couple of years, and suspected. The second time I picked up the hickeys I noticed that one was about the size of a big fingernail cutting-- and rubbery! When I looked at the press, there was a divot on the _top_ roller that matched the hickey. I now knew my rollers' days were numbered. There were roller "crumbs" in the job. I treadled on, hoping to finish the job before things headed south.

Then I noticed some deep cracks on the left side of the middle rollers. But my job was on the right side of the chase, so I kept treadling. But right in the middle of the run, the _bottom_ roller of the three began rising on the _left_ side! Oh no. . . but again, printing was going fairly well still. Hoping against hope, I made a decision to go for broke. I need to finish that job before leaving on our trip, even though the middle roller was scoring itself with the 2 lines I was printing today. Even.

The decision, alas, was made for me a few impressions later. Where the left-side deep cracks on the middle roller were suddenly gave way and a 5" chunk of composition jumped right off the core! I'll finish up the run on my Pearl or Golding Official. Good thing it's the smallest area for the last run. Those rollers looked almost like new at the beginning of this week. They were _not_ new, but they were apparently in excellent shape. I have never had composition rollers go bad so quickly and thoroughly. All mine have been fine for 10+ years. But things happen, and it looks like it was my turn for it :)



My conclusion is that the composition was going bad before it was visibly damaged, and that somehow affected the way the rollers were sticking (or not) to the disk, and possibly the cause of the rising roller ends. I'll get them replaced and then see what happens then. There was no friction problem in the roller saddles, shank, or other parts, all of which were well-oiled.

These shots are of the suddenly fallen-off-the-core chunk of the middle roller. The last shot is of all three rollers, where you can see the divot on the top roller (to the right), the missing chunk and some scoring on the middle roller, and deep cracks on the right side of the bottom roller.

APA Wayzegoose

Sorry, no pics til I get home, but here in Lansing, MI, I'm having a great time hanging with fellow APA members. That's Amalgamated Printers' Association, a group of hobby and other printers.

I'm sometimes not sure how I qualify to hang with such witty and talented folks. It's nice to be able to talk shop, swap stories, and admire other printers' work though. Today we all enjoyed a trip to Owosso Graphic Arts, a company that makes printing plates and commercial dies. Very nice people and an excellent service for printers. They deal with huge businesses and hobby printers alike.

After lunch, we visited a steam train museum whose line has the name of Pere Marquette. What the crossover between letterpress and steam is I can't say, but there is a strong connection. My highlight was riding on a caboose as it was switched from one track to another.

This evening, Joe Warren talked about scoring and die cutting on a platen press. It was a highly useful talk for those of us who have only printed on our presses. Joe showed us examples of scoring matrix, explained the use of a jacket for die cutting, and demystified die cutting with sample dies and their products.

Then Arie Koelwyn gave a talk about using unusual materials to print with. He has used bent rule, children's suncatchers, thin foam cutouts, wood letter cutouts, nature materials, and almost anything flat he can fine, mounted type high, inked, and printed. His printing is always well executed and attractive, so his use of these materials is encouraging.

And that's just the first day of the Wayzegoose. Stay tuned. Tomorrow begins the feeding frenzy: the yard sale in the morning, followed by the auction in the afternoon.

Chase Lifter, Part the Second

Done! And it works. Not bad for a mechanical non-genius. Photo shows the pulley suspended from the "rail rider," with the hooks hanging limply in place. Since I live alone, I don't have a photo of my device in use. Too bad. But here's the photo of the completed device:

To use it: I rest the chase (form) on the left arm of the press, near the counter you can see in the photo. Using one hand to steady it and the other to place the hooks, I engage the hooks under the edge of the chase, in the open areas of the lockup.

To lift the chase, I hold firmly on to the loop (in the photo, it's looped over the counter) with my right hand, and ease the chase into position with my left. Once the chase rests on its ledge, I release the hooks with one hand and engage the chase clamp. (I made the hand loop a more reasonable size after this photo was taken. No danglies.)

The tricky part is when I release the hooks. They want to drop, making the hand loop zoom to the very top of the pulley. With one hand, I have to get one hook end into the hand loop so that the hook ropes form an upside-down Y engaged by the loop. Once the chase clamp is engaged, I can slide the entire lifter assembly back along the rail so it doesn't interfere with the press.

Inspired by Rachel's description of Duane Scott's chase lifter, this is what I came up with. I'm quite happy with it and expect to use it a lot.

Surprise, I'm posting again: Chase Lifter, Partially assembled

On the Letpress List, there has been recent discussion about a helper tool for installing a form into a 10x15 C&P. The form and chase can be very heavy, and installing it to print requires lifting it, leaning forward, and lowering it gently into its bed.

My hands aren't all that strong, and a heavy chase strains the back muscles a bit. What better idea than to install a chase-lifting pulley assembly!

When I went out to survey the territory, I realized I had an advantage: the rail for the rollup garage door runs right over the press. All I needed was some sort of angle iron to rest over the rail, and I could then suspend a pulley and hooks. When I need to open the garage door, the chase lifter can slide back out of the way.

Finding the correct vocabulary for the the hardware store employees was less than easy, but I was lucky enough to be assisted by a couple of young guys who were capable of thinking outside the (tool) box. I had a drawing of what I wanted to do and asked them what parts might function as I desired.

One of them had a brilliant thought: he went into the wood yard and returned with a stud anchor: a piece of strap iron bent into a U with flanges (dare I say "serifs?"). I straightened out the flanges and lo, the sides hang down and the chain links fit into them.

Photo 1 is what I have dubbed the "rail rider," AKA "deck post tie." Attached to it are some links with screw-threaded closures. They meet in a plain ring, and a third screw-threaded closure attaches the pulley to it.

Photo 2 is a view of the rope and hooks. Tomorrow I will cut about 1/4 inch off the end of the hooks to allow the jaws to be large enough to admit the chase. The rope holding the hooks will loop into the pulley rope.

Note: the rope "ferrules" still need to be crushed to hold the ends of the rope from slipping. I will do that in the vice tomorrow.

I don't expect this device to hold the entire weight of the chase/form for long; it is simply a tool which will bear part of the weight of the chase while I jockey it into place. I'm very excited about testing it tomorrow afternoon! Stay tuned: by tomorrow night I hope to have results and a photo of the finished device.

A Done Deal!

I had a bit of trouble getting started on the annual NaNoWriMo thing this year. That's where you basically give up your life to write your heart out in the month of November. NAtional NOvel WRIting MOnth. 50,000 words is the goal. You heard me right: 50 thousand!

Last year's novel, yet un-edited, was about some ancestors who survived one of the many kinds of health tragedies the 18th and 19th centures had to offer: an epidemic of Yellow Fever. The family lost 5 children in 8 days. In the middle of that time, the poor mother gave birth to the youngest child. I figured if I couldn't wring a plot and some drama from that situation, I was a washup as a writer. I managed, but was burned out by month's end. The story was just too grim.

This year's novel is youth fantasy, aimed at 5th- 6th grade. Talking animals, you know! I love cats, and have good opportunities to observe them at home and in the shelter where I volunteer. So my story's cats begin in a shelter, escape, live through threats and disasters which many abandoned cats do face, get trapped, wind up in a shelter-- and finally find their own home to settle into. I'm quite happy with it.

Even though this year's novel isn't quite finished, I WON by producing those 50,000 words. Gotta tell you, it feels wonderful to have accomplished those. And I promise, I won't just give up and not edit it, because this story was actually fun to write! Well, fun if you don't count the looming deadline and the sore hands from all the typing!

A theatre costuming teacher I once knew had a mantra: "Done is Beautiful." Said in whatever tone of voice you feel, it works. And so, chanting my costumer's mantra, I wander off into the sunset, with my NaNoWriMo WINNER banner lifted high.

Now, back to the printing press! I've completed two colors of a three-color job today!

Meanwhile, back at the Type Addiction

I found a single piece of wood type, a "sort," at the Printers' Fair in Los Angeles (actually, there are a couple of others, but this one is the problem child). (Event held at the International Printing Museum, Carson, California)

After years of perusing type catelogs I thought it looked familiar. I needed a classy M for the occasional printing I do for myself. When I got home, I eagerly thumbed through a couple of type books, and it isn't there! What is it?

Looks most like something in Dan X. Solo's Solotype Catelog. On page 44, in the left column, is a font he called "Harlech." The M in Menu looks only kind of like my M, as you can tell.

And now, since I am posting this on Letpress, the granddaddy of the Letterpress discussion lists, I hope to be able to post a sequel to this, giving the font my nice M sort comes from.

It's been a long cold summer and then. . .

Monday, it was over 105 here in town. Whew! Summer waited til Fall to show up, but it is now cooling once again. By next week we should be at "normal" (the 70s). I'll take it. But that's not the reason for this post.

This is! I dropped by the local thrift store today, and almost left skonked. But a pair of candle- or lampshades caught my eye. I decided they were so pretty they had to come home, whether or not they saw use for candles or electric lamps.

On my way home, I decided they would be utterly perfect for my vintage hallway/library lamps. The modern, commercial shades didn't do much for the fixtures I'd found on eBay and rewired myself. See the difference (before on the left, after on the right). Aren't the red shades more graceful? I love them!

A Day in LA

Yielded this somehow. . . reedicklewockleness. You heard me right. There's a certain wrongitude about this notice. . . unfortunately the shop was closed when a friend and I happened by at dusk. I'd have tried the sushi anyhow, lack of shrimp notwithstanding.

Phierce Phidian

Ordinarily a loving, soft marshmallow, the appearance of his natural enemy, the dread Toypennatus, can make this furry gentleman a Phierce Phoe. . . Mr. Phidian L. Golding, in all his Pherocity!

Chasing a Dream, err a. . . Chase

Ever since acquiring my 1886 Golding Official (a tabletop 8 x 12!), I've wanted a second chase. They seem even more rare than Pearl chases by the same maker. So I asked Robert to saw me a chase-size piece of plywood.

A chase needs shaping before it can seat in the bed of a press: there are lugs which hold it in place which require corresponding notches in the chase. There is also a spring-loaded clamp to hold the chase securely. The chase edge must be the correct shape for the clamp.

We accomplished shaping a few days ago. I began by trying to match the original chase's lug bevel on all four corners, with rounded-over edge in the center. But the crude tools we were using (belt sander & rasp) weren't up to detail. We ended up with one whole edge beveled and the other one rounded. That's all it really needs-- roundness to match the chase clamp, and a bevel to fit snugly into the lugs. Below is the result:

Right side bevelled to correspond with the lug bevel; left side rounded for clamp.

Bevel matches lug bevel, but it's not an exact science.

Chase fits exactly, with no side play. Rounded top fits clamp. Success!

Next month I will have a chance to put this chase to the test! Needless to say, it will not carry work which I have to lock up too tightly. I'm thinking it will be the perfect thing to hold cuts or second-color infills for jobs locked up in the original chase. Done- is beautiful!

Font ID, part two: Radient No. 1

I followed a friend's tried-and-true recipe for cleaning my new/old font (see previous post). Mr. Clean, believe it or not! I soaked the type for a few minutes, then slowly wiped down each separate piece on all sides. The face was last, swiped against a soft, Mr. Clean-dampened rag on the workbench.

Once each piece was dried, I then wiped them down all over again. Yes, each piece. This time I used paint thinner (mineral spirits). Its oily residue will protect the type from possible corrosion. It's an uncommon survivor, at 134 years old, and I hope it stays around for another 134. Or so.

See how clean it looks now! DO click to biggify-- and see the entire font, now beautifully clean.

Another Font ID

Several years ago I bought out a hobby shop which was long disused. It had not been well-kept, and it has taken me this long to begin taking a closer look at what was in the cases.

One case was labeled "Antique Egyptian Shaded," but I looked more closely at it while cleaning up today. Oh my-- it is an old face, and the pinmark tells me it's from Johnson typefoundry in Philadelphia. I'm posting the photo so my listward friends can see it, and determine if the name on the case was correct. I don't have a Johnson specimen book to check it against.

Stay tuned. Under all that dirt, the font is in pretty good shape.

CLICK TO BIGGIFY (and hopefully see the entire font!)


And the rest of THIS story, courtesy of Letpress and Steve Saxe:

Your type is Radiant No. 1, designed by Herman Ihlenburg, patented 18 July 1876 for MacKellar Smiths & Jordan. (I'm happy to say that it's in my new book, Loy's  "Nineteenth-Century American Designers and Engravers of Type".) [ SHAMELESS PLUG: $59.95, Oak Knoll Press, with 800 high-resolution scans of typefaces pictorial borders.]   It's very similar to Condensed Ray Shaded, the Bruce foundry's competing face. . It's not an Antique or Egyptian - no slab serifs, they are bracketed.

After the death of Lawrence Johnson, the new owners, who had been his former employees, continued to call the new company ( MacKellar, Smiths & Jordan) "The Johnson Foundry" out of affection for their former employer. This type was designed well after the new owners were in place, from 1868 on.

Back to Letterpress

Actually!

Since my return from the Wayzegoose, I have been shoveling out the Den of Iniquity to make room for my new type purchases. In the process, I've been finding some interesting or odd things that I set aside to find out about later.

I took my copy of Rob Roy Kelly's Wood Type book (recently available from Liber Apertus Press) to try to identify some of my previously acquired wood type. Not that there's a lot-- but I like be able to call it by name, affectionately, as I use it.

One of the fonts I bought on eBay (before prices skyrocketed) turned out to be "French Antique" (page 255, Kelly), without its lower case or numerals. It's almost exactly the same size as pictured in Kelly. There is a very odd sort associated with the font, however. It doesn't fit with any of the characters in Kelly's showing, yet its size and style clearly associate it with the font I have.

Kelly says this font was "First listed by William Page in the Typographic Messenger during 1869." My font has no maker's mark, but it is exactly the design shown in Kelly.

But what is the odd sort below?

 

The Rest of the Story: I love my APA and Letpress lists! Less than 10 minutes after I first posted on the lists about this odd sort, I had an answer! Thanks to Greg Walters (APA) and Alan Brignull (Letpress), each of whom identified this as an "fl" ligature. Since I have no other lowercase sorts, it was difficult for me to imagine. Kelly doesn't show the ligatures with the lowercasee.

Broken Spring- a Detour

My Baltimorean No. 2 (4 x 6) (we're back to printing presses here) has a broken spring. So this is a "commercial" break in the Sespe Wilderness tale, while I post photos and ask for help in getting a new, specialty spring made so I can restore this press.

First the actual photos. The gripper bar works because the spring sits on it and has a long, straight extension resting on the press frame. The spring is broken at one of its coils, so there is now no resistance. This makes the gripper flop uselessly forward when the press is closing, and when the rollers come back down they ink right over the gripper. Not so good.

Photo #1: you can see the broken part of the spring. It used to continue around to the bottom of the bar, where its end was poked into a small hole in the bar, which you can't see from the top.

Photo #2 A view from the outside, showing the long extension which feeds through a hole in the frame casting, under the platen.

And finally, my schematic of the way it works. The broken piece of the spring is the last round (bottom most); the X shows where, underneath the gripper bar, the end of the spring fits into a hole.

If you can PLEASE suggest where to start-- I need to order this spring remanufactured. Would I contact a blacksmith? a machinist? Thanks for any input! Also-- to keep this available on Letpress, please duplicate your comments to the list, if you will be so kind.

Who can resist wildflowers and ruins?

Not many words to add. Wildflowers & ladybugs, then a tumbledown rock chimney between the creek and our camp.

These were really lovely, if no quite in full bloom. Silvery foliage with lavender bursts of flowers. Each flower cluster had a ladybug or two. I guess ladybugs like nice homes too.

These bright yellow wonders seemed to grow everywhere. The bushes are about 2 feet high and loaded with blooms.

And I could simply not resist a scenic ruin. This chimney was build not far from its source, the creek. Stones are tumbled smooth by annual floods.

Click! Biggify!

Further amenities, more flowers

Our first day in camp was a kickback kind of day. A leisurely breakfast, some good coffee mocha, and a slow pace were welcome after the ride the day before. All six of the ladies decided to hike up to the hot springs, which is only about a mile away. Why bother? In one phrase: hot tub!

Off we went, up a trail that's steep in places, but had amazing views of the creek & valley below. I took no photos of our hot tub experience, but I'm sure you'll understand that for some things, a discretely drawn curtain is really the best choice. We loved the hot tub! All too soon it was time to return to camp for lunch.

On the way back I was able to take a few more wildflower shots; I will probably edit this post when I figure out the flower names. The wildflower book is full of possiblities, but I can't see some details in my shots.

 I had to lean over the bank and focus in as close as I could to take this one:

I don't know what it's called-- but I liked its pink-to-white transformation. And yes, the bank below is really that steep.
 Don't forget to click and BIGGIFY!

Amenities

Exploring our campsite the next morning, I was quite taken with the CCC camp we were next to. They were camping there while doing trail work so we hardly saw any of them. They got back to camp in the evening and were usually asleep by the time we finished dinner. What caught my eye was their hot water heater. That's a 40 (?) gallon garbage pail over the fire, and a chimney with spark arrester on top!

Up the trail in the background are the scenic restrooms. They offer a lovely view: 360 degrees! They are shielded by the trees, but little else. In actuality, of course, they are nothing more than a seat over a pit. Hey. This is real camping, after all. We're in the back country. Scenery is everything.

Even better, though: we had running water! Not in the privies, but where it counts: the kitchen and the horse trough. There's a natural, 365 day spring. The water is delicious.

Speaking of delicious, so was our food. Thanks to Shannon's inventiveness we ate well indeed. First night she kept it simple, and we had spaghetti. With venison. Delicious with salad and some garlic bread. It was so windy that she used a Coleman stove inside the tiny bunkhouse. There are four bunks, but most of us slept outside for the night.

The first night was restless. The wind was strong, making the tents flap alarmingly. The horses don't like wind, so they were moving around the pasture a lot: hoofbeats all night. False dawn really looked like dawn, so I slept fitfully from then on, grateful for a nice warm sleeping bag. I wasn't getting out unless I had to.

By daylight we could see the lupine in camp: all blue, but some were pinker than others. On my computer screen I can tell the difference, but  I am noticing that colors once posted  to the blog are less than stunning. So click to biggify, as always, and enjoy! Hint: first pic is the pinker variety.

Evening pasture

A few more Sespe Creek crossings and quite a few meadows later, here we were. Willit Hot Springs is about a mile from camp, but camp benefits by a natural spring of its own. Water pressure is so good that the tap for the watering trough must be left on a little so it won't blow its hose connection. The pasture for the horses is about 5 acres.

Low hills between us and the Topa Topa range show in the foreground. We scanned them for signs of larger wildlife, but didn't see so much as a deer. This view is looking southeast toward Santa Paula. Our tents are just off camera to the left.

What a lovely restful scene at the end of a long day.