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Restoring a screw or book press
Hello all,
I acquired from my parents a large Screw Press / Bookbinding Press (Overall 24"x24"x13" fully tightened). It was made late in the 19th century and is really heavy. My parents used it for print-making when I was younger. My brother played with it and mildly damaged the lower platen. I got it disassembled, hauled up from my parents basement, reassembled on a pallet, and shipped to California.
The platens are flat. and the mechanism works smoothly. I will clean the rust and repaint it. The lower platen was painted / coated with a a thickish substance (Pitch, Bitumin, Paint, Not Japanning) and there are some pits in this coating. I could scrape off the coating, Patch the coating or ignore it and use a piece of harness leather as a substrate for the lower platen. Opinions?
Sorry if this is the wrong forum, but where else? I will post photos in a few minutes.
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Here is a shot of the blemishes in the lower platen.
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And now the rest of the story
So here we are, 95% done. Under 30 days; but this might have been only a long weekend before I got sick. Still, progress.
I decided not to try and fix what isn't broken. Thank you for the suggestions everyone! So the first thing was masking and protecting the platen surface. The disassembled base is not solid but is very heavy (>200 lbs) so not the easiest for me to manhandle. (I don't know why it occasionally want a photo to be in thumbnail mode - see the bottom of the page).
The moving (top) platen had light surface rust on working side. The photo looks worse than it was. I wetsanded with MS at 600 Grit. and then 1,000. Waxed it up but left unpainted. Checked out very flat according to my straightedge. The bottom platen is also flat. I suspect they spent a lot of time on the top platen and then use the resin / surface against this to true each together.
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So what I thought was badly chipped paint ended up being a hundred years of inks and glues. There was a lot of time chiseling, chipping sanding, and otherwise removing this. The places without the ink had surface rust. Cleaned it all (not perfect, nor is the casting) and painted the top and sides.
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Turning it over, I found the real work. A scrape, a little sanding and EvapoRust treatment and it could be painted too. Let me tell you how fun this was... I did learn a lot about EvapoRust however.
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I want this on casters as it is really heavy to move without. It will sit in my Garage / Shop - hopefully under the TS extension. I cut some laminated poplar at the angles of the sand casting to fit snuggly. I figure gravity will hold it down when flipped right side up. Casters go on.
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Flipped over and assembled. I left the yoke and the wheel cleaned and waxed only. They had no rust on them. The yoke was painted Black. The wheel was japanned but most of it has worn off. The beer is for scale ;) (shame about the flare). i didn't notice it at the time. You see a melamine covered piece of flat baltic birch between the platens. I have a few others of different thicknesses and resiliencies. I still have the lower platen masked off until I do a maiden pressing.
It probably would look better if I bead blasted and completely rebuilt and painted. But, my father's and grandfather's hands were on that wheel and I want the connection.
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One last comment. The previous owners left glue, ink, sweat, tears, and blood on this; but the working mechanism and the working surfaces were in great shape. These were people who valued and cared for their tools.