"Jim Wilkins" on Fri, 5 Jul 2019 08:36:21 -0400
typed in rec.crafts.metalworking the following:
"pyotr filipivich" wrote in message
.. .
whit3rd on Thu, 4 Jul 2019 15:36:44 -0700 (PDT)
typed in rec.crafts.metalworking the following:
On Wednesday, July 3, 2019 at 9:54:37 PM UTC-7, pyotr filipivich
wrote:
thinking of doing some small (and I do mean _small_) milling,
to
make a set of molds for casting type for hand setting printing
(aka
"Letter Press").
The molten plastic ink jet printer I helped develop in the 1980's
could 3D-print mirrored and color-separated (CYMK) offset
printing
press plates.
Which is so totally what I do NOT want to do.
If I wanted build a printer, I'd have asked how to do that.
One can get job-shops to do the 3D printing; the old IBM typeballs
were
nickel-plated plastic, seemed to print entirely adequately.
Or (in linotype fashion) you could carve some soft material to make
a matrix,
then cast type against that. Instead of a mill, the matrices could
be (old technology)
produced with a pattern lathe.
Milling anything hard, and keeping tight tolerances, is a difficult
combination. Clamping
any workpiece as small as a letter is a project all in itself.
From what I've been reading: there is an Iron letter "punch" which
then stamps into a softer metal (copper) which then serves as the
mold
for the lead type. As they were carving punches (to make coins) in
Mainz in the 1300's, I'm going to assume I can short cut a few steps
and use modern material science to my advantage.
--
pyotr filipivich
"With Age comes Wisdom. Although far too often, Age travels alone."
Sure, the tech to do that is simple enough that I had it in my college
dorm room. A candle, a blowpipe and a small hand-cranked grinding
wheel is enough to make and harden engraving tools out of masonry
nails etc.
https://toolguyd.com/hand-powered-co...rinding-wheel/
The college bookstore provided the blowpipe and calligraphy pens and
ink to practice lettering. All I lacked was sufficient artistic
talent.
A blowpipe enables prospectors to smelt ores to metal with equipment
they could carry in a shirt pocket.
https://www.wired.com/2014/08/crazy-blowpipe-apparatus/
The microcosmic salt used as a flux can be obtained from dried urine.
You can also use the blowpipe to create a small white-hot forge fire
in a depression in a chunk of charcoal from your campfire.
Cool. Will have to look into _that_ too.
Since then I've acquired and learned to use machine tools, but the old
hand methods with hammers, files and chisels still serve me for making
small tools, for instance hardened and tempered hooks to pry out the
press-in plastic fasteners on my car.
You can find the basic skills in books on making jewelry and clocks,
and traditional gunsmithing.
https://www.amazon.com/Pirotechnia-V.../dp/0486261344
Type casting is on page 376. The book is an excellent snapshot of
preindustrial technology, though not a DIY manual.
So many of the Ancient Books, assume a base level of knowledge to
work from. Of course, so do modern references. As I said to a friend
in tech school "Francisco speaks better than he knows, calling the
Machinery Handbook, 'the bible'. For like the Bible, it is full of
great and useful information - if you know how to understand and
interpret it."
I saw a comment on the "making the clutch for the Music machine"
video, that the guy made his money on a Haas, but kept his sanity with
a Bridgeport.
--
pyotr filipivich
"With Age comes Wisdom. Although far too often, Age travels alone."