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General view of the casters and keyboards
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The Press has a Monotype Super caster, of 1956 vintage. It was originally owned by Heffers of Cambridge, and then by the Thumbprint Press of Oxford, and now resides at the Alembic Press. The caster has no varigear, but relies on the gear box
for control of casting speed. The caster is not yet as clean as new, but does work, and we have cast type from 6pt up to 72pt. However, we have not yet tried casting leads or rules, although we do have the attachments for this. |
| We also have two Monotype Composition casters. One, of 1968 vintage, was originally owned by GKN of Warley, then Black Swan Press, of Grove. This caster is fitted with Varigear, and with a slow speed gear box, and so far has cast type from 8pt to 36pt. It is also fitted with Unit Shift, and Unit Adding. It is proving slightly stickier to run than the other composition caster, since the single phase motor is often tripped out, especially in cold weather, and we are considering returning it to 3 phase. We started learning to cast with this machine, and continue to use it for the more experimental work such as 15x15 and 15x17 matrix case composition, or display types. It has even cast sorts from 36pt U.S. display mats |  |
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| The other composition caster is of 1956 vintage, and was originally owned by Heffers and then Thumbprint. This caster has no varigear, simply using a rheostat to control the speed. It is fitted with Unit Adding and with Unit Shift, and after initial teething problems in getting it adjusted after some 15 years rest, is now running easily, and in use for casting many of our books. |  |
 | However, as it has no gears, it does tend to slow down when the column pusher is activated and the type moved into the galley at the end of each line.
On the left is a picture of a completed galley of type, taken away from the caster, but before the type is moved to the printing half of the barn to be proofed. |
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Composition for these two casters is done on the two operational Monotype Keyboards. Both are 1971 vintage, one being ex Heffer and one ex GKN. Monotype keyboards are powered by compressed air, and use a qwerty key layout usually with sufficient keys for roman, italic, bold and small cap alphabets.
We have assorted mat cases, stopbars, wedges, justifying scales, etc., though most are for 16x17 (ie with Unit Shift).
  
However we do have some button banks and keybars for 15x15 and 15x17 matrix cases. |  | A pump for the caster above |
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| Above are views of the various styles of button banks, and a set of keybars. Below is another view of the foundry. In the foreground are the two keyboards, at the back on the extreme left is the air condensing tank, with the Super caster in front of it. In the middle at the back is the newer Comp caster, and on the right of the door is the older Comp caster. Almost out of sight in the foreground are the shelves of moulds, keybars, and numerous spare parts, etc. |
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