Roller Issues
Hi, everyone. I recently inked up the Boxcar photopolymer samples and seem to be having trouble with the roller height. The rollers inked bands of color across the Boxcar base. My press is a 10x15 C&P Craftsman. The rails are adjustable, they’re at type high. I checked the rollers over and over again with the setting gauge and the rollers appear to have flat areas/expanded in others. Is there a way to tape the trucks to account for the high/low inking or should I just bite the bullet and buy new rollers? Thanks in advance. I also live in Nashville, any recommendations for roller providers (preferably East Coast)? I checked out Tar Heel Roller, NA Graphics and Ramco.
I’ll leave it to someone more experienced to chime in, but it sounds like its time to replace your rollers if they’ve gone out-of-round.
I have the same press, and I need to buy rollers. The great thing about the Craftsman is that it has 4 ink rollers. The bad thing about the Craftsman is that you need to buy 4 ink rollers for it.
It may be that you need new rollers but it would be a drag if you bought new rollers and put them on your press and still had bands printed across the base. Did you put a straight edge up to the rails to check them for flatness? Have you removed your rollers and checked the bearings and cores and examined the roller surfaces? My advice is to get in there and get dirty and oily and check every aspect of the motion of the press and each part that might affect the problem including the base itself and be sure you need new rollers because you’ve ruled out anything else. Then you’ll feel more comfortable spending for new parts plus you’ll most likely have learned something new about your press. Old presses need lots of looking after.
Bruce
I always taped my trucks, I use electrical tape. but all the taping in the world won’t work if your rollers have flat spots. I get my rollers from Roller Craft in Rhode Island. All 3 places you checked out for rollers are good people to deal with, I don’t think you will find any place cheaper than Ramco.
Thanks for the responses. I bit the bullet and just bought a new set of rollers. Figured it would be best to have a back-up set on hand anyway.
To keelan, are you using the Rice feeder or hand-feeding? I took off the grippers to the feeder and closed the handle to the throw-off for hand-feeding. The Rice feeder seems to be making a lot of air noise. I’m not familiar with this feeder. On the crank shaft there’s a chamber and it still produces a blast of air coming out of the connections for the hoses in the front. Does yours do this with hand-feeding? I’m unsure if it’s producing a blast still for the paper-pickup or what. I could post a video/pictures if my explanation is horrible, ha.
To Bruce cpd, I took apart the roller pieces, the ball bearings in the trucks were all on one side of the truck, which did make one side of the roller vastly lower. Fixed them, put it back together and back on and still got some bands of ink on the base. The rails are spot on and straight. They’re adjustable and a bit of tweaking got them where they need to be. If only rollers were that easy.
To dickg, Taping the trucks was the only thing that helped. My print was a bit starved due to having to raise the rollers so high so the one expanded side didn’t ink the base. I ended up ordering rollers from NA Graphics, I couldn’t find much from Ramco’s website. I’m pumped to have some fresh rollers!
Also, is there an easy way to take off the rollers? I’m currently just letting the rollers come to a stop at the bottom of the press and just lifting one side of the saddle, taking that roller out, rolling the rollers up on the rails to get the bottom roller out.
“I took apart the roller pieces, the ball bearings in the trucks were all on one side of the truck, which did make one side of the roller vastly lower. Fixed them, put it back together and back on and still got some bands of ink on the base. “
Sounds like there are bearings missing, a radial bearing should either have no gaps between the balls, or a cage to hold them evenly spaced. A pic could be interesting to see. You might need new trucks or bearings.
I believe you will find it easier and convenient to put the rollers up at the bottom on the disk to remove and install them.
I intend to use the feeder with my press, I haven’t actually printed with the thing yet. The air pump in the base of the press moves air as long as the press is operation, the air valve assembly at the front-bottom-left vents the air pump to the atmosphere if you’re not using the feeder.
The pump produces both vacuum for the sucker arms, and the air blast to help with pick up, so you’re hearing air going in both directions. If you’re not intending on using the feeder, you could remove the air pump from the crank shaft. The pump actually adds quite a bit of resistance to turning the press over by hand. With the pump disconnected, my press will roll through a couple impression cycles on its own, just from one good push on the flywheel.
If you plan on leaving the pump connected, you should make sure to unscrew the packing gland at the top of the pump, and put in a few drops of hinds foot oil to keep the leather seals from drying out.
If you’re planning on removing the feeder, let me know; I’m on the hunt for parts for mine.
re: lifting rollers, did your press come with the pictured roller lifter tool?
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