After a wonderful long weekend in Las Vegas, and some intense power-shopping, and a birthday and 1st year anniversary of being married (both celebrated in Sin City), I am back in the studio and ready to show off photos of the reassembled Chandler & Price. Well, a partially reassembled Chandler & Price...
As you can see below, the flywheel is not back on 100%. Ok, not even 15% I'd reckon. The darned thing just won't go back on. It keeps on getting stuck. We filed down the crankshaft, used a blow torch, doused the parts in WD40, and nothing. Welcome to my own private little hell.
I have no idea how to get it back on, and despite my husband's and my efforts, this is as far as we can get it back on. The press works, but is it safe to have the wheel only partially on? Probably not. I hate this, because as everyone knows, I am anal retentive to the max, and the fact that the blasted wheel won't go back on 100% will haunt me while I sleep. If anyone has any suggestions, please feel free to leave a comment.
Here is a photo looking through the wheel at the crankshaft. Yep, you can see, it's barely on. It is time for more cursing.
Another small issue, the throw-off lever doesn't work. The mechanism the lever is supposed to activate is just plain stuck in the back. I am wondering if the previous owner locked it in print mode on purpose, because nothing moves. Blech...all these little issues are driving me crazy. The press will work as is, but it's not right.
Anyways, I think I'll leave everything as is for now, and maybe do a print run tomorrow with my "not-quite-right" press. The good news is that I tested out my Boxcar base in the chase yesterday with no ink and got quite the nice little impression, with absolutely no packing. This makes me happy, and will of course provide enough fuel for me to keep working it it.
Sometimes I think letterpress printing is like golf - time flies when you are in agony.
Here is a photo of a new item in my Etsy shop.
Happy letterpressing!
Hi Erin,
ReplyDeleteThe thing to remember is that if the flywheel came of it will go back on but there might have been some slight damage in transit after it was removed, especially on the end of the shaft.
You filed around the shaft but did you also file a slight bevel all around the edge on the end of the shaft? Also, looking at the photo you posted showing the end of the shaft through the hole in the flywheel I noticed several mushroomed areas at the edges of the hole. Remove the flywheel and file down any mushroomed areas at the hole edges on both sides using a half-round file. It doesn't take much of a ding to mushroom the metal even a little and this would keep the flywheel from going on.
The flywheel should not be so tight on the shaft that it will not spin on the shaft without the key in place. After filing as above use a bit of sandpaper and then a 3M pad to remove any burrs from the filing and polish the steel a bit.
I can't say anything about the throw-off situation without seeing photos of the back of the press.
Rich P.
Milford, NJ
This sounds dumb because I have no idea...but; my press has a little slide-in "pin" on pole the flywheel goes on. We had to pull the pin out and put the wheel on, then put the pin back in. I don't have a C&P so I don't know it that is obvious or not.
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