Bronze is hard, but brass is shiny. Bronze makes weapons, brass makes buttons. But copper makes rotogravure plates.
The type used to hand set type for letter presses used to be made of foundry metal, but I don't know what foundry metal was made of - harder than lead, softer than steel, I think the alloy included lead and zinc, maybe copper. It had to be soft enought to be melted and poured into a very fine matrix, and hard enough to retain its shape when used in the press. The type is cast "letter high", which means that it's on a little stem or stand that's the height of the frame that the type is set into, all one piece for each letter. The large sized letters are tacked to a wooden bit that holds them " letter high".
This was all made obsolete by Monotype, which is softer, has more lead, and is formed by a nifty typewriter that is attached to a mini-type foundry. Made by the Germans, Mergenthaler, brilliant.
But for short runs, hand set type is still efficient, like wedding announcements and concert posters, so there is still a niche of letter press shops, here and there.
Printing is what I know, dear. I worked in an engraver's shop for a year, and around letterpress for a couple of years, although I never did letterpress, I was a photolithographer, for seven years.
Mr. Wrenn, that owned Joseph B. Wrenn engraving, was in his 70's, and so were the real engravers in the shop, and that was about 25 years ago. I just shot camera, because all they did anymore was photo-engraving, but they still had all the tools for hand engraving. They had an acid bath for etching the cuts, but it was a union shop, and I never got to touch any of the engraving equipment. |
