You think you have problems - or not just me

[MikeMusic]

Speaking to a big metal litho printer, standing alongside his monster 6 unit B1 (sheet size) Speedmaster - the size of an articulated lorry

Found problems in stability after the mammoth job if installing it.
Instability could cause the machine to wreck itself. I'm guessing this is at least £500,000 worth of kit so worth playing safe
They bite the bullet and uninstall it.
Dig up the floor and sure enough one side of the press was resting on about 1" of concrete which sat on *loose* earth
Phew
Floor dug up and all sorts of steel and concrete put it to make sure of a 100% stable foundation
Press resinstalled
Down time about 2-3 weeks *no* printing



Same problem still there........
Duh

[prestonchipfryer]

That's one big Heidelberg isn't it?

Have you ever used a Heidelberg platen? When I left school I worked for a local printers and they used platens (letterpress). All typesetting was by hand using cases. Used to get the d p q and b mixed up. Long time ago now.

John

[MikeMusic]

That's one big Heidelberg isn't it?

Have you ever used a Heidelberg platen? When I left school I worked for a local printers and they used platens (letterpress). All typesetting was by hand using cases. Used to get the d p q and b mixed up. Long time ago now.

John
You must be old !
:)
When I started in 1974 letterpress was on the way out, litho the up and coming thing
I was in the upstart copying, not real print at all, now it's descendants are taking over
They have a platen in the same rather large room. Fairly sure just for cutting and creasing

[prestonchipfryer]

You must be old !
:)
When I started in 1974 letterpress was on the way out, litho the up and coming thing
I was in the upstart copying, not real print at all, now it's descendants are taking over
They have a platen in the same rather large room. Fairly sure just for cutting and creasing

I'm 61. And I left school aged 15. Yes litho was the way to go in the early 70s.

You must know Linotype typesetting machines. I worked for a newspaper using a Linotype up til the early 1980s and then came computers. All passed into history now.

John

[isuckedmandelsonslemons]

I'm 61. And I left school aged 15. Yes litho was the way to go in the early 70s.

You must know Linotype typesetting machines. I worked for a newspaper using a Linotype up til the early 1980s and then came computers. All passed into history now.

John

I know Linotype machines. Dare say I could work one even now. It's almost 40 years to the day since I started as an apprentice compositor on my home town evening newspaper. I moved into journalism and ended up editor of the paper. At the time I was the only editor in the UK to be gaffer of his home town paper.

The twats sacked me but that's a whole new other story . . .

Harry

[walpurgis]

Sounds like somebody with some engineering sense should have been brought in.

Me personally, dealing with heavy items, I always carry out an investigation of the bearing capability of whatever is going to take the load and obviously a large precision machine will require accurately leveled placement. I'm guessing your machine is not on a level.

[bobbasrah]

Well if they are dumb enough to throw a half million machine onto a floor without checking it first, they are pretty much plonkers.
If they then made a dedicated plinth for it to manufacturer's spec, they would have levelled it to tolerance and shimmed it surely, so summat in the machine is askew from the sounds of it.

[walpurgis]

Probably thrown out of kilter through the initial dodgy installation.

[MikeMusic]

I'm 61. And I left school aged 15. Yes litho was the way to go in the early 70s.

You must know Linotype typesetting machines. I worked for a newspaper using a Linotype up til the early 1980s and then came computers. All passed into history now.

John
Younger than me !
I didn't go a printing until my early 20s
Saw one hot metal machine and made the mistake of buying a Linotype photo typestter - talk about complicated - and just the interim before Macs

[MikeMusic]

Sounds like somebody with some engineering sense should have been brought in.

Me personally, dealing with heavy items, I always carry out an investigation of the bearing capability of whatever is going to take the load and obviously a large precision machine will require accurately leveled placement. I'm guessing your machine is not on a level.
Quite. Something is distinctly not right
Glad to say not my machine.
I was surprised they didn't investigate the floor before install

[MikeMusic]

Well if they are dumb enough to throw a half million machine onto a floor without checking it first, they are pretty much plonkers.
If they then made a dedicated plinth for it to manufacturer's spec, they would have levelled it to tolerance and shimmed it surely, so summat in the machine is askew from the sounds of it.
Very old building so who knows when the foundations were put down - if they have any

[prestonchipfryer]

Younger than me !
I didn't go a printing until my early 20s
Saw one hot metal machine and made the mistake of buying a Linotype photo typestter - talk about complicated - and just the interim before Macs


The cradle which holds the pot failed on the machine I was using and hot lead, antimony and tin just missed my left leg. Very close, but quite a laugh when then engineer asked how I had managed to break it.

You can imagine my reaction (the air was blue) but I still had a bollocking from the overseer.

I sure miss those days. :)

[MikeMusic]

The cradle which holds the pot failed on the machine I was using and hot lead, antimony and tin just missed my left leg. Very close, but quite a laugh when then engineer asked how I had managed to break it.

You can imagine my reaction (the air was blue) but I still had a bollocking from the overseer.

I sure miss those days. :)
Missed hot metal and letterpress. Never really got litho. I'm just a copying boy, morphed into a digital printer