Crafty Wonderland’s Super Colossal Spring Sale is happening tomorrow, Saturday May 11th! I will be there with all my prints and cards and even my Kelsey press (if you want to feel what a real letterpress is like!). Porcuprints is booth #159, so swing on by. As an added incentive, the first 200 shoppers will receive goodie bags with awesome
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While I was building the base for my Kelsey Printing Press, Doug worked on a stand to hold the rollers. He designed it, and built it in no time. I was thoroughly impressed! It is truly original and functional. I just had to share it with everyone. He cut two slots into each side piece to hold the roller cores,
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I finished the Kelsey Press wooden base! Actually, I finished it last weekend, but I am just getting around to posting pictures. I sanded, painted with stain, then coated it with a couple coats of polyurethane. Then I bolted the press on, and voila! I made the base from reclaimed wood, so it has some reminders of its previous use.
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For those of you who follow me, you know that I have been out of commission recently due to an elbow injury. As a result, I have had to find ways of being useful without hurting myself. This weekend, I made a base for my press! I am not in a position to just screw my little Kelsey into a
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Recently Doug and I finished making new roller hooks for the Kelsey press. The old hooks were both bent out of shape, and visibly worn down inside the hook area. Yet again I find that I forgot to take making-of photos for this step, but I hope finished product photos will do. In the picture above, the top hook is
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Every part of the Kelsey press has finally been put back together! And here are pictures! The only thing missing are the roller hooks. The old ones are bent and I believe we will have to make new ones. Other than that, it’s finished. This is what it looked like BEFORE: And AFTER: The next step is to make a
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Shims and grease are two things that are quite important when reassembling a press, and I did not want them to get lost in the glitz and glam of retaining rings and finished pictures. While they aren’t as pretty, they are necessary! Shims: When we first started fitting the dowels in the press, I noticed that some of the cast
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Just created a treasury in honor of my Kelsey Excelsior letterpress that I just finished restoring this weekend! Enjoy.
When I first disassembled the Kelsey press I knew that I would have to replace the original dowels that held the parts together. The majority had been mushroomed on one end and deformed with a chisel and hammered into the other. I can only assume that this was done by the Kelsey company to stop people from taking the press
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The platen portion of the Kelsey Letterpress is made up of two main castings, the platen and the platen back. These two pieces are held together with a very strong spring held in place by a dowel. The screws on the platen back are not for holding the pieces together, but rather for adjusting the impression pressure. BEFORE: When I
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