Roller trucks won’t fit on rollers

I just recently purchased a Pilot / Craftsmen style table top platen press and I can’t seem to get the roller trucks to fit on my rollers. All four roller trucks appear to be the same size. I was able to get some to fit on one of the rollers but when I try each one on the other roller none of them fit. They appear to get stuck on the little nub that sticks up from the roller core. I have attached a photo showing the one roller with the roller truck all the way on and the other with it stuck. Has anyone else had this problem? Is there some adjustment that I can make to either the core or the truck? Do the trucks come in different sizes? The two that did eventually fit were pretty hard to get on.

Thanks!

image: IMG_2176.jpg

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i have had the same issue. i could get the trucks on some of the cores but not on the others. i tried to rig it so it would work, but i should have known from the start that they wouldn’t ink properly. IF it is just the nub that is giving you grief, see if you can file it down a little with a metal file, but if the truck fits too snugly on the core itself and that’s why you can’t slip it on, then you have a real problem. there is really no way to adjust these things without sacrificing proper ink coverage so see if you can send back the roller that is giving you the problem; the cores really should be the same size.

The nubs on the roller cores are made by squeezing the core with tremendous power and forcing the metal to rise into the ‘nub’. Very often this nub is crude at best especially if these are new, unused cores which have never been fitted to the press. A small flat file is all that is needed to shape the nub down to size. Most often the nub is too thick to fit the slot in the truck but sometimes it’s too high also. Take off a little at a time and keep trying it. The trucks are macnined and should be uniform so dress down the nub and do not attempt to alter the truck.

The rollers are in fact new so I think it is as you suggested musikwerke that they just haven’t been fitted to the press. I was able to get a hold of the very nice man that I bought my press and rollers from and he has offered to fit the trucks to the problem roller for me. Thank you both for your help - good advice for the future should I encounter this problem again and have to fix it myself.

Just an FYI for anyone else who’s had this problem: when I pulled the trucks off the old rollers of my C&P pilot press, they were really dirty, and same as these folks, two of the trucks wouldn’t fit on either roller. I got a stiff pipe cleaner (you could probably use a piece of steel wool or a scrubby pad) and cleaned out the inside surface of the trucks, as well as the core end (there was some industrial lubricant gunk left there). I got some vegetable oil and lightly oiled the trucks and the core ends, and voila! they slid on rather painlessly. So, perhaps before you file the nubs, try that.