The Green Ring Press is born!

One of the last classes I took as an undergrad was printmaking. I loved it. We worked mainly in intaglio, mostly etchings. I've wanted to get back into printing ever since the end of that class, but etching presses are horrifically expensive. And extremely heavy, what with the steel rollers and press beds, so even if you can find one used, it'd cost a king's ransom to have it shipped.

So, to make a long story short, Matt and I have been trying to think of ways to build a press for some time. I am not a machinist, or even particularly mechanical, so it did not seem likely that I would be able to build an etching press myself, no matter how much I wanted one. Then I found out that my favorite online printmaker, of http://trailhoundz.blogspot.com/ (how could I not be a fan of someone who does printmaking and adopted 3 retired racers?), built a press from instructions at a Mosswork's studio website, http://www.mossworks.com/ .

This is not designed to be an etching press, and I haven't tested it with drypoint yet, but it will do any manner of relief printing. (Unfortunately, the plates for those take a lot longer than I was hoping, so I won't have images of our prints to put up until a little later.) Still, it's very, very exciting and Matt and I have been having a ball so far with it. What a lovely guy I have to make something like that for me. (Afterwards, I bought him a "thank you Wii", so don't think he's all work and no play. ^_~)

Here are some images from the Making of the Press.

Here are the major components, plus a lot of fiddly hardware bits and some springs.

Getting started in the garage-cum-workshop

The doubled 2x4 is centered under the press bed, with a matching set at the top of the press.

All it needs now is the driving force, Jack. Captain Bottle Jack, to be precise.

This square of plywood will become the platen. The countersunk eyebolts hook up to the springs which retract the platen when the pressure from the jack is released.

Ta da!

We're still getting the hang of the actual printing process, so I'll have to post scans of our prints later. When we have nicer ones and I want to take time out of carving printing blocks to scan images...