T206 Print Groups-A Quick Overview

[steve B]

I suppose I may as well go against the grain here as well.

Assuming Scot Readers estimate of 370 million produced and the larger sheet of 34 subjects X 5 of each for a 170 card sheet that's nearly 2.2 million impressions. At 1000 sheets an hour that's about 54 weeks of work per color just to print the cards. Or about 7-9 Years of labor depending on how many colors you think were used including backs.

In other words ALC must have been running the T206s on multiple presses at the same time.
Even assuming a large sheet.
Even cutting the estimated production in half it still would have required multiple presses operating simultaneously.

So while they were packed and distributed based on some known dates the printing most likely was ongoing with multiple backs being printed at the same time.


Steve B
PS: I know, the time required to print is another solid argument for a larger sheet. There's also a technical issue of balancing the time to print against the time to cut and package. Larger sheets of small things require a lot of cutting time. But small sheets take more printing time. Someday I'll have to ask someone I know if threre's a formula.

[White Borders]

Originally Posted by steve B

PS: I know, the time required to print is another solid argument for a larger sheet. There's also a technical issue of balancing the time to print against the time to cut and package. Larger sheets of small things require a lot of cutting time. But small sheets take more printing time. Someday I'll have to ask someone I know if threre's a formula.

Steve,

Thinking outside the box, I've always assumed that each sheet ALC printed carried the same back for all the different fronts on that sheet (such as P350 #25 as all the backs on a sheet, or SC350 #30 as all the backs on a sheet, but never a mix of different backs on a sheet). With this assumption, is it possible that instead of cutting the sheets at ALC, the entire sheets were shipped to the appropriate ATC factory where they were then cut into the individual cards and packaged with the tobacco? Is there any proof one way or another?

Best Regards,
Craig

[Abravefan11]

Craig-I don't know that anyone can prove where the sheets were cut for certain, but to me (just my 2 cents) it's most logical that they were cut at ALC. Cutting the cards was part of creating a finished product. That is something the print house would be responsible for. Just as they would with business cards, posters, box labels, or just about any other printed product.

One of the brothers who printed the E222 set was a "cutter" for A. Hoen, a large lithography company in Richmond, prior to starting Fulton Press.

[Abravefan11]

These videos show two examples of cutters used in printing facilities.

The first is for a manual cutter that more than likely predated the T206 set.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0JJajMda3w

The second is for a cutter run by an electric motor that is closer to what ALC would have been using.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5ABCCeZ8Wo

[steve B]

Originally Posted by Abravefan11

These videos show two examples of cutters used in printing facilities.

The first is for a manual cutter that more than likely predated the T206 set.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0JJajMda3w

The second is for a cutter run by an electric motor that is closer to what ALC would have been using.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5ABCCeZ8Wo

Those are some cool videos.

I ran a corner rounding machine a couple times that was made in 1910. Basically a much smaller version with a foot pedal.

The machines hadn't changed much by the late 1970's. Bigger, hydraulic power for both the holddown plate and blade, and the the strip the blade went into was plastic instead of wood. A few other modern things like two buttons to actuate the blade so you couldn't put your hand under the blade.

Typical practice was to trim the borders, then make cuts that cut the sheets into mor manageable blocks. So a 10x 10 sheet got cut into 4 5x5 partial sheets before finally getting cut down. The blade would have been adjusted for each cut. Then the whole stack cut, sometimes 20,000 sheets. Adjust for the next cut, repeat.....

I'm with Tim on the cutting. ALC delivering completely finished cut to size cards is the most likely scenario.

There would be maybe a couple reasons to have done it differently.
If the plants were using automated packing machinery that used strips of cards and cut them during the packing/inserting process. But I'd call that unlikely. I'd expect to see a number of cards factory cut on two sides, as well as a few uncut strips.
The other would be if ATC wanted the sheets sent uncut. There would be less expense in packing, but then they would have to pay someone to do the cutting. Probably not worth doing since they'd have to buy the equipment and hire people to run it.


I don't think either of those happened, but that whole era was one of massive advances in manufacturing machinery. Lithography was changing from stones to metal plates, more stuff was being run by electricity, stuff like that.

Steve B