Knowledge is power : $b A view of the productive forces of modern society and the results of labor, capital and skill.Knight, Charles
Philosophy
Knowledge is power : $b A view of the productive forces of modern society and the results of labor, capital and skill.
Knight, Charles
Industrial arts; Industries
But there are many hundred copies to be despatched by the morning mails.
Manchester and Glasgow would be frightened from their propriety, if the
daily London papers did not arrive at the accustomed hour. The London
merchant, banker, lawyer, would go unwillingly to his morning labour, if
he had not had one passing glance at the division in the House, the
state of the money-market, the last foreign intelligence. Late as the
paper may have been in its mental completion, Manchester, Glasgow, and
London will not be kept without that illumination which has become
almost as necessary as sunlight. Machinery has been created by the
demand, to carry the demand farther than the warmest imagination could
have anticipated. In 1814, Koenig, a German, erected the first
printing-machine at the "Times Office," and produced eighteen hundred
impressions an hour on one side. The machine superseded the duplicates
of the type which were once necessary, painfully and laboriously to keep
up a small supply, worked by men, with relays, at the rate of five
hundred an hour. In 1818 Edward Cowper produced his cylinder-machine,
which effected a revolution in the commerce of books; and, in connexion
with the paper-machine, enabled the principle of cheapness to contend
against an impolitic and oppressive tax. This is still the machine in
general use for many newspapers and much book-printing. We will briefly
describe the operation of printing a sheet of paper on both sides by
this instrument.
Upon the solid steel table at each end of the machine lie the pages
which print one side of the sheet. At the top of the machine, where the
laying-on boy stands, is a heap of wet paper. The signal being given by
the director of the work, the laying-on boy turns a small handle, and
the moving-power of the strap connected with a steam-engine is
immediately communicated. Some ten or twenty spoiled sheets are first
passed over the types to remove any dirt or moisture. If the director is
satisfied, the boy begins to lay on the white paper. He places the sheet
upon a flat table before him, with its edge ready to be seized by the
apparatus for conveying it upon the drum. At the first movement of the
great wheel, the inking-apparatus at each end has been set in motion.
The steel cylinder attached to the reservoir of ink has begun slowly to
move,--the "doctor," or more properly "ductor," has risen to touch that
cylinder for an instant, and thus receive a supply of ink,--the
inking-table has passed under the "doctor" and carried off that
supply,--and the distributing-rollers have spread it equally over the
surface of the table. This surface, having passed under the
inking-rollers, communicates the supply to them; and they in turn impart
it to the _form_ which is to be printed. All these beautiful operations
are accomplished in the sixteenth part of a minute, by the travelling
backward and forward of the carriage or table upon which the _form_
rests.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account