Printing Plates

[Win94ae]

Are these plates Linotype?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v39/justgoto/Guns%203/PrintingPlates_zps7e4166c7.jpg

They have corrosion with a tan center, then grayish black, turning to a white exterior.

Scratching it as hard as I can with my fingernail, it mars the surface ever so slightly.

[Win94ae]

It looks like it might be zinc.
Revere premium zinc (http://www.giffingraphics.com/Download/Revere%20Premium%20Zinc%20Specifications.pdf) [PDF file]

Revere premium Triplemetal®zinc starts with
the highest grade zinc spelter available, which
is carefully processed in our facility with
precision traces of aluminum and magnesium,
to produce a smoother etch.

[Airman Basic]

From my newspaper days, they might be zinc, magnesium or aluminum, depending on age. If they're magnesium, they'll turn into giant fireworks sparklers if they get hot enough, but stand back and they'll burn through just about anything. Yeah, we did that when we were young and stupid.

[fryboy]

look up litho plate , no good for our uses sadly ( and i have a 5 gallon bucket full of it out in the shop )

[bangerjim]

Sorry, no ceegar! Worth pretty much nothing to a caster.

They are relative modern litho plates as mentioned above. And are made of zinc. They are photo-etched many times.

Lino is in strips as you can see on several threads on this site.

Contact shadygrady on here. If they are zinc, he may want to trade you lead for them.

bangerjim

[jsizemore]

shadygrady will trade you for lead if they are zinc.

[Defcon-One]

It looks like folk art to me. Clean it up, frame it and hang it in your shop!

That is what I would do!

[Win94ae]

It looks like folk art to me. Clean it up, frame it and hang it in your shop!

That is what I would do!

Yep, that is why I kept them.

[merlin101]

It looks like folk art to me. Clean it up, frame it and hang it in your shop!

That is what I would do!

Or sell on flebay as a "one of a kind vintage" piece of folk art. The more you use "vintage" and "collectable" the more it's worth!

[Miata Mike]

I had some Stereotype lead printing plates from the early 60's that I melted down last year. The printing surfaces were very hard and were skimmed off. Not sure what that material was but my scrap yard paid me a little bit for it. The plates were for a 3 or 4 color run and some of the art looked like it could have been bread bags.

Seemed like regular soft lead that I mixed with roofing lead if I remember right. Here is a quote from a patent that kind of describes the process:


Stereotype plates for printing presses are commonly cast in casting boxes by pouring a hot molten metal comprising a formula containing lead, tin and antimony with lead being the basic ingredient and tin and antimony in lesser quantity percentages.