Adast Press: Any feedback? Anyone used it?

Adast “GPF” Grafopress- looks/seems kind of like a heidelberg windmill.

Here’s an ebay listing:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Adast-GPF-Grafopress-10-x-15-Auto-Feed-Press-Foil-/360334254610?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item53e5986212#ht_8389wt_1141

Not thinking bout picking it up or anything, but curious if anyone has seen/used one before?

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I believe it’s a Czech knockoff of the Windmill. Not sure if there is any part interchangeability between the two. Not sure what kind of runners they are, but if they were built decent in the first place, they’d probably be ok. Actually, I think they are still built by Adast (or whomever they are now).

I did a quick websearch, and it seems Adast is going out of business. They make some offset presses (sheet fed) and have a facility out in Chicago which sold presses. Interesting to see that someone actually went thru ALL the steps to make a windmill knockoff.

I know there has been talk here before about Vandercooks, Heidelbergs, etc. being remade by knockoff companies- and even an indian company that entirely remade clone C&P platen presses… But this is just the first time I’ve come across a knockoff windmill, so I thought I’d ask.

There are a number of companies still making proof presses of various types, but noone is doing Vandercooks on a production level. FAG makes a proof press for Lithography (offset proofing press), there’s a line-o-scribe knockoff out there, and a few manufacturers of proofing presses that are like Galley proofers/pocos (1 in the UK and in europe), and some companies listed on the vandercook press info site Paul Moxon Maintains. I’d be curious though to look into just what it would cost to reman something like, for example, a Uni III letterpress or a Dufa IV offset proofer.

The Heidelberg is a traditional brand. The Grafopress Not so nice. But cheap and good. I have one. Printers and leadtype woodtype. Fully meets my needs. I like this machine.It also created a video tutorial. Unfortunately only in Hungarian.
http://youtu.be/jTiP17HX8IY

The Czechs could copy the windmill, because they were part of the East bloc, and rights of western companies were not respected, I saw a Russian Linotype knockoff a month ago, it got sold for scrap, I managed to save a box of matrices. They seem compatible with original Linotype matrices.

You can find an image of the machine in this thread: http://briarpress.org/25176

The shop this machine was in had two Grafopresses, the shop was mothballed (10 years ago, they sold it a month ago) when the axle of one of those broke. I got a whole cabinet of type (18 cases) and various plates and a lot of furniture out before it was all scrapped, got a big ol’ slug cutter/miterer too, looks quite heavy-duty. There was an old man, who was disassembling the presses for spares, he took the gripper-rotor assemblies, and some smaller parts off.

Üdvözletem András!
Jó itt is összefutni magyarokkal :). Jól értem, van egy orosz Lino szedőgéped? Az én Grafómat vas árba sikerült megvenni, a MÉH telep helyett került hozzám. Egyre több emberrel futok össze akik fantáziát látnak a magasnyomásban. Hamarosan megalakul egy hagyományőrző nyomdász civil szervezetünk is. Már csak a papírokat várjuk. Jó lenne felvenni egymással a kapcsolatot.
Üdv!
Szili József

Kedves Jozsef!

Sajnos (bar a felesegem szerint nem :D) szedogep meg nincs, csak egy Heidi tegely, a szekreny betu, a vakanyagok, meg a megmentett ontomatricak, meg monotype gephez keresek matricatalcakat. Sajnos nagyon hely szukeben vagyok, egy telepen taroljak nekem a dolgaim, majd nyaron latok hozza a muhely osszehozasahoz.

Szivesen lepnek kapcsolatba masokkal!

Udv, Andras

(Rest of the world: Sorry for the Hungarian, we’ll revert back to English, so you’ll understand more. :D)

Szervusz András!
Valami ilyesmit keresel? Elég olcsó…
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Antique-Printing-Machine-Block-Pat-Dates-1903-19...