well its that time of year again and i had to print the firemans ball ribbons for the local vollenteer fire department. i have no clue how larger companies print specialty ribbons but i am very familiar with how we do it.
first we use a press thats exact date of construction is unknown. its a Chandler & Price press with a Kluge feeder, to give you an idea of its age it is the FIRST sheet fed printing press that ever worked correctly............trust me this thing couldnt pass an OSHA approvement if it tried :grin: ................yah have to push start the friggin thing(pictures to follow tonight)........
the form that holds the type that we print weights roughly 70 pounds you have to lift this out of the press every time you want to change the wording like from Chief to Asst. Chief to Fireman or what ever...........there are 8 changes in all............you feed the ribbon up from a rigged up holder down in the bowels of the press, feed it through some slices in the paper that you print against and the machine puts the ink on the form than it squeezes the form against the paper table and if yah have everything lined up correctly the ribbon gets printed..........and then yah pull the ribbion out 6-12 inches and it prints another one and so on and so on..................500 ribbons later(every one who attends gets a generic ribbon) your back is screaming and if your lucky yah havent hurt a finger lifting that 70# form in and out or any other number of ways of getting caught in that contraption..........my back is frigging killing me................
oh well glad i only print ribbons once a year.....................im off to supervise DSL being put into our house........will take pics of the press when i get back to work and upload them tonight...............
first we use a press thats exact date of construction is unknown. its a Chandler & Price press with a Kluge feeder, to give you an idea of its age it is the FIRST sheet fed printing press that ever worked correctly............trust me this thing couldnt pass an OSHA approvement if it tried :grin: ................yah have to push start the friggin thing(pictures to follow tonight)........
the form that holds the type that we print weights roughly 70 pounds you have to lift this out of the press every time you want to change the wording like from Chief to Asst. Chief to Fireman or what ever...........there are 8 changes in all............you feed the ribbon up from a rigged up holder down in the bowels of the press, feed it through some slices in the paper that you print against and the machine puts the ink on the form than it squeezes the form against the paper table and if yah have everything lined up correctly the ribbon gets printed..........and then yah pull the ribbion out 6-12 inches and it prints another one and so on and so on..................500 ribbons later(every one who attends gets a generic ribbon) your back is screaming and if your lucky yah havent hurt a finger lifting that 70# form in and out or any other number of ways of getting caught in that contraption..........my back is frigging killing me................
oh well glad i only print ribbons once a year.....................im off to supervise DSL being put into our house........will take pics of the press when i get back to work and upload them tonight...............