Power at Work

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 24 April 1937, Page 1 (Supplement)

Power at Work

PROCESSES IN ORDER

A Daily Epic Speed and facility are the two factors which have must inuuenced the development of the mechanical equipment required in the production of the modern newspaper. The mechanical plant of even a few decades ago would Lie simply inadequate and incapable of meeting the demands of to-day. Fifty years ago newspaper printing was done by tin assembly of small pieces of type, which were inked and subjected to the pressure of paper, upon which appeared the finished article. Fundamentally, such methods still furnish the basis for newspaper production, bu' the expanding demand for a daily journal, driven by the advance of popular education, has related them t~ obsoletism THE LINOTYPE A Marvel of Mechanism Anuthina but Talk Perhaps the most radical advance in the machinery of the newspaper world has been the evolution of the linotype machine. In truth, there is really nothing quite like this marvel of mo tern mechanical engineering. 1‘ has been said that a linotype machine can do anything bu speak. And there is less extravagance in the' remark that first impressions would suggest. It is to the linotype machines that "copy" passes after it leaves the news departments. The linotype, like so man} other machines, is the result of the demaiu for speed and facility. Type-setting used to be done by hand —a tab' rious, vearying business, and as slow as it was unromantic. A piece of type for each letter had to be picked from a box (a “case,” u it is technically known) ana each piece placed in position, with spacings, until a line was completed. In the average column of newspaper reading matter, there would be perhaps 8000 or more pieces of type, and in the full page, when finally assembled, mor than 60,000 and sometimes 70,000 pieces. The preparation, or “setting,” of that full column would occupy one compositor for nearly a -'ay. MANY ADVANTAGES The compositor’s work of one day is done by the modern linotype mac..»ne in a little less than one hour by a competent operator. Mechanical typesetting is barely half a century old. though to-day’s machines, of course, offer a striking and engaging contrast with the pioneers in this field. Yet peed is not the only advantage. The linotype, as its name suggests, sets type in one line, so that the line (a full column in width) is the unit of type, instead of the individual letter as in the case of hr ad setting. Hence the handling of type became easier as he machine replaced the manual operative. A "ompositor can to-day pick up, with one hand and without assistance of a tray or an,/ other container. perhaps 40 or more lines of type, moving it easily and speedily as equired.

THU HIGHEST INGENUITY

The linotype machine expresses Inventiveness and human ingenuity in the highest degree. To describe the machine and its operation fully would, l. the Hist place, demand the attention o< a skilled engineer, and, in the secoro would oroduce an account in which the average reader would have not e -lightest inti rest, so intricate is the machine. 'An attempt is made in the present article, therefore, to describe it only in outline, ignoring all but the fundamental processes in its operation. The main difference, in principle, between the hand-setting of type and machine-setting is that in the former the compositor handled type itself,

whereas in the latter the units are moulds. Each letter in the linotype machine is a brass mould, known as a matrix. The matrices are kept in a “magazine,” from which each one is released by a touch on a key; the keys, together, form a “board” roughly similar to that of a typewriter. In the each character—that Is to say, each letter, each numeral, each sign of £, %. ©. and so on, and each mark of punctuation—is kept in a separate channel. Thus all the matrices bearing the letter "e” are together; all the “g” matrices are likewise segregated. And the release of a matrix from its channel is controlled by the corresponding key. THE MACHINE AT WORK

For a rough parallel, then, it may be said that the linotype operatoi works much as the typist does. At the touch of the keys, the matrices fall into an assembler, where they are held firm. It is then that the lead is brought into use The lead lies in a molten condition tit is kepi at a constant temperature by heating i in n small pot. When the matrices have been assembled, the line into which they have been p orii.ed is brought over an aperture. As the line reaches its place a pump Inside the poi operates, and forces the molten metal through the aperture, against which the moulds on the matrices are pressed Momentarily, that section of the machine halts and in that brief fraction of a second the lead solidifies. It has been cast into a single line The line is then trimmed by kni'es to the most exact dimensions, and is ejected on to a tra.v affixed to the front of the machine But the marvel is not yet complete. V, her the line has heon cast, a long a. n swoops down, picks up the matrices which have mrmed th„ line itself, and re-distributes them, returning each one to the channel from which it originally came TYPE ALWAYS FRESH The linotype offer:, one more ad-

vantage which has no relation eithei to speed or to facility. When type Is used for printing it is restored, afterwards. to its '‘case." and used over ana ovei again. The linotype makes il possible to secure a fresh surface typ< it all times The matrices in its magazines do not suffer from wear, as do irdinary- pieces of type from which piinting is done direct, and the result is that, by casting ty-e in a line ol lead, a fresh printing su'Tace is available for every occasion, producing cleaner and more legible printing in ht finished article When the linotype machine has corn-u-led ns vvoik. 'he news of the day has undergone a transformation. Ni longer is it in the form of "copy, ’.yped o r written bj hand It has taken 'he form of metal