One of my new Monotype books

One of the books I recently acquired from Don Black has the rather bland title Function and Operation of the 15-17 Casting Machine but after reading this book, I see how the subtitles reveal its true importance: Including Supplementary Equipment and A Supplement to “Casting Machine Adjustments” Published 1930.

As the subtitles suggest, this book, published in April of 1959, covers more than just the 15×17 matcase and adds to the 1930 Casting Machine Adjustments information on equipment added since that date. It describes how the equipment operates and provides adjustment instructions, using references where available to plates in the 1955 Plate Book—’Monotype’ Typesetting Machine—the Composition Type-Caster. The topics covered include:

• the 15×17 matcase
• quadding and centering
• Patton spacing attachment, which uses the J+H air combination rather than special low-quad matrices to cast low quads.
• Varidrive with Rockford clutch

I think that anyone who has an American composition caster and a copy of Casting Machine Adjustments should also have a copy of this book. Because I feel this document is so important, I have scanned it and posted it as a PDF file with searchable text. I have not had a chance to review and correct the searchable text yet.

Lanston did not spend much on the production of this book. The body text looks somewhat like it was typewritten except that it uses a variable-pitch typeface. The paper is plain flat white, and the cover is an instant blotter for grease and fades easily. It does not have the durability of either Casting Machine Adjustments or Plate Book; that and the understated title explain the relative rarity of this book.

I have two copies: one in excellent condition, and the other with fading on the cover. Considering the good condition,  large type, and lack of added notes, the relatively coarse 300dpi scans I used were more than sufficient for preserving and disseminating the information from this book.