What with helping to get our daughter’s Hallowe’en costume finished in time, and trying to clean our store for the studio tour coming up this weekend, I have had little time to work on my Monotype. The current tasks are…

Last but not least of the control valves to be serviced on my Monotype caster is what I refer to as the Mould Signalling control valve. Depending on what options the caster is fitted with, this valve might be used…

After a short side trip to test and trace the individual air lines on my caster I have returned to the task of refurbishing the various pneumatic control valves. The next one to do is the Quadding and Centering control…

On removing the dummy plate on my Unit Adding valve base and testing individual air lines, I have determined that: This valve uses lines I, K, N, 0005, and 0075 (not J, K, N, 0005, and 0075 as my manual…

Using a sports inflator needle to apply compressed air to each air line individually, I am finding several oddities. The first is certainly not unexpected: Several of the airpins are sticking. I think my best bet for these is to…

Just for a lark, I tried connecting my Monotype caster to a compressed air supply, and found that the air connection to the paper tower leaked so badly that the (admittedly small) compressor could not keep up. I tried putting…

After breaking two pipe ends while reinstalling the mounting plate for the Unit Adding valve, I decided that soldering in new ends would be easier than trying to get a flaring tool into the tight spots under the Monotype caster’s…

I put my replacement pneumatic lines on my Monotype caster and replaced the Unit Adding valve mounting plate. You can see them in the photo as the two clean pipes near the bottom, and the two shiny threaded ends second…

The Quadding and Centering system on the Monotype composition caster is controlled by two actuators on the paper tower. The one for Quadding is a simple piston inside the tower housing which causes the motion of the paper tower cam…