Before we were even involved in the setting up of CPC, David Sarles and I acquired the old TR King molds from Dennis & Glenn O'Neill. We held back the one each serviceable molds for the small and large crowns and the rest of them were donated to Nevada Historical Society.
Due to the nature of these mold plates, quite different to anything we have ever used before, a considerable amount of work (and money) was needed to convert these to a form required for compression molding. This is something that has been worked on by us and a local machine shop over the past year, we were not in a position to take this on up until now.
I have just returned from the factory where I was involved in the final stages of this work and the initial testing. We are now in a position to bring these molds into production, subject to a few limitations which became apparent during the two weeks testing.
Both molds contain only 15 cups, so the likely yield is 12-13 good chips per cycle. This likely puts them on a par with the Diamond-Square mold, and considering the costs we've incurred on this project, we would have to price them the same, at least for now.
The construction of the original plates, with cups held in place by a combination of clips and welding, mean there are only limited adjustments we can make. However, the quality of the samples produced in testing seem to indicated there is plenty of use left in both these molds.
Small Crown mold
I'll show more pictures later when I have everything unpacked but this mold will be recommended for 7/8 and 1 inch inlays. The mold was designed to produce chips with a slightly concave center and we found this prevented the necessary suction being obtained to secure 1-1/16 inlays. It also causes a problem with hotstamping as described below. It's worth noting that the majority of TR King inlays on both molds were 15/16 inch, something that we can't do.
Many of you who have come across freshly made hotstamped small crown chips will be aware that most display 'scratch marks' where excess foil (flashing) was removed with a blade by TRK. It appears this happened because of the slightly concave nature of the chips (we are only talking about 3/1000 inch here, barely detectable without a micrometer, but enough to affect the stamping on our industrial machine), so for now we will not be offering hot stamping. However, for any of you out there with a lighter weight machine, this could be a profitable future project for you.
Large Crown mold
This mold will only really produce good chips with the 7/8 inlay size. The mold has a 'ring' between 15/16 and 1 inch across, slightly smaller than most of our existing molds, suited to the TR King 15/16 inlays. The ring is deeper than our existing molds meaning that larger size inlays get stretched (and even torn) during pressing. Again I have more pics to show later.
Hotstamping yielded better results but we were out of time so will have to reserve judgment on this until we can produce a reasonable quantity of samples during our first proper run on the mold.
We have a limited amount of samples available on both molds for customers, I will be adding these to the website as soon as I can. It will take a little work (and cost) to get them added to the Chip Design Tool though (but I'm working on it).
We are ready to start taking orders on both these molds now, with a view to the first runs being in early 2019 if everything else permits.
Due to the nature of these mold plates, quite different to anything we have ever used before, a considerable amount of work (and money) was needed to convert these to a form required for compression molding. This is something that has been worked on by us and a local machine shop over the past year, we were not in a position to take this on up until now.
I have just returned from the factory where I was involved in the final stages of this work and the initial testing. We are now in a position to bring these molds into production, subject to a few limitations which became apparent during the two weeks testing.
Both molds contain only 15 cups, so the likely yield is 12-13 good chips per cycle. This likely puts them on a par with the Diamond-Square mold, and considering the costs we've incurred on this project, we would have to price them the same, at least for now.
The construction of the original plates, with cups held in place by a combination of clips and welding, mean there are only limited adjustments we can make. However, the quality of the samples produced in testing seem to indicated there is plenty of use left in both these molds.
Small Crown mold
I'll show more pictures later when I have everything unpacked but this mold will be recommended for 7/8 and 1 inch inlays. The mold was designed to produce chips with a slightly concave center and we found this prevented the necessary suction being obtained to secure 1-1/16 inlays. It also causes a problem with hotstamping as described below. It's worth noting that the majority of TR King inlays on both molds were 15/16 inch, something that we can't do.
Many of you who have come across freshly made hotstamped small crown chips will be aware that most display 'scratch marks' where excess foil (flashing) was removed with a blade by TRK. It appears this happened because of the slightly concave nature of the chips (we are only talking about 3/1000 inch here, barely detectable without a micrometer, but enough to affect the stamping on our industrial machine), so for now we will not be offering hot stamping. However, for any of you out there with a lighter weight machine, this could be a profitable future project for you.
Large Crown mold
This mold will only really produce good chips with the 7/8 inlay size. The mold has a 'ring' between 15/16 and 1 inch across, slightly smaller than most of our existing molds, suited to the TR King 15/16 inlays. The ring is deeper than our existing molds meaning that larger size inlays get stretched (and even torn) during pressing. Again I have more pics to show later.
Hotstamping yielded better results but we were out of time so will have to reserve judgment on this until we can produce a reasonable quantity of samples during our first proper run on the mold.
We have a limited amount of samples available on both molds for customers, I will be adding these to the website as soon as I can. It will take a little work (and cost) to get them added to the Chip Design Tool though (but I'm working on it).
We are ready to start taking orders on both these molds now, with a view to the first runs being in early 2019 if everything else permits.
:wideeyed:
