C&P O.S. Split Disc on a C&P N.S. Press
I have been curious as to how compatible Original Series and New Series parts are between the two press. I recently learned that that the bolts on early New Series presses are still the same as the Original Series, at least up to ‘24. I happened to have an Original Series with a split disc, and a New Series with a solid disc, so I thought I’d give it a shot and take some photos for posterity. I’ll comment them in order so that the assembly makes sense.
Apparently, all that you need now is the lower bevel gear to drive the inner disc. That might possibly be in the same category as Hens’ Teeth; however, I’m sure that there’s one floating around out there somewhere. Oiling the sliding surfaces might be an issue. Interesting presentation, very! Good luck!
Frank.
Very cool. I recall that years ago Arie Koelewyn had a batch of the side and bottom gears made up in bronze. I imagine they are long gone.
DGM
Nope. I still have a few of both the bottom gear and the center gear. These are rougher castings that need a lot of filing and machining to make them usable, but they’re still available and inexpensive.
I can think of no particular advantage a split ink disk offers, other that it looks very cool during the initial ink distribution. It does require some extra cleaning and maintenance.
If the center disk is worn on the inside, it probably needs more oil. The C&P oil chart does not have it marked, but it still needs it. I have run mine for over 20 years without any noticeable wear.
If you’re talking about the short little pawl that engages the bottom gear, it can be replaced, but not in the original position. My machine shop tried, but could not drill out the old one (too hard they said), which had ben mostly ground off when I got it, so they put in a new one 90 degrees from the original.
Gerald, I’m curious what your reasoning has been to shim the disk in the past, and how you determined proper height? That isn’t something I had thought of before, but not I’m curious. I want to say my rollers hit my disk about 1.5 inches up from the bottom edge.
Brent
Gerald:
Have not had any problems with oil rising out of the divide between think disks. I do have to wait for roller wash to evaporate out of the gap, though, between inkings. Not a problem at the speed I work, but if you’re doing multiple colors in a day it could get annoying.
I’m not sure that the rollers hitting the ink disk a bit lower makes all that much difference. The majority of the ink transfer occurs in the center, where the rollers have nearly full length contact for more than a revolution of rollers. The tiny (relatively) area at the lower extreme, where the rollers are in contact for a fraction of the length, aren’t going to add much ink transfer. One more impression cycle will do much more.
I don’t know of any replacements for the “38 disk lever pawl” (from the C&P parts list) other than machining a new one. Usually if it is that badly worn, the teeth cast into the back of the ink disk are also badly worn down and need to be rebuilt. I suppose you could weld/grind new metal there.