The Haunting

_________________________

Blood of bat and bone of cat,

Tongue of frog and tooth of rat,

Hog’s hair, claw of bear,

Three times three, now follow me…

Ghosts sometimes appear when least expected and at the most inopportune times. This can present problems for those of us who steadfastly deny their existence. But there are times, especially when practicing the ancient craft of printing, that we must at least partially confess the truth that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy.

I made my second etched plate last weekend, soft ground on a 3” x 4” copper plate. This was done the same as with the pine branch, laying some twine on the grounded plate and running it through the press. As it turned out, I made a mistake when doing this that I’ll detail below. I let it bite for about 25 minutes, a time that was based mostly on my experience with the pine branch and also on the line etching I did as my first experiment. I think I judged it better this time, though I’m happy with the pine branch as well.

To pull the proof I again used Graphic Chemical's Bone Black ink. And except for the final, and I think the best proof, their 150 lb. cotton rag house paper. For that proof I used my trusty unknown 20 lb. laid paper.

The first two proofs are shown above. Note that the one on the left was final wiped with newspaper and the one on the right was hand-wiped. After the first proof I noticed the ghost image circled above and thought it was something I had done during the wipe. But it appeared again on the second proof so I moved the plate slightly on the bed and got the result on the third proof seen above on the right: the same ghost in a different place. Those pesky spirits! I thought about this for a while and before organizing a séance I examined my felts carefully and found a matching depression in the catcher and cushion and then also in the woven pusher on the cylinder. This ghost hadn’t appeared in any other proofs I had pulled previously and it pretty much matches the size of the coil in the noose. And I did in fact run the plate through the press at right angles to the direction I pulled the proofs, which explains the orientation. So my conclusion is that I should have used more padding and less pressure when running the grounded plate through the press. Another lesson learned.

Here is the last proof I pulled which also received a final hand wipe. I’m rather pleased with it and call it Too Much Rope.

P.S. My thanks to Barbee Oliver Carleton for the poem from her children’s story The Wonderful Cat of Cobbie Bean that I first read as a boy in the book, The Arrow Book Of Ghost Stories, that I bought for 15 cents through the Scholastic Book Services at school in the 1960’s. Do they even still have books in school?

Well Grounded

Intaglio fun continues. Last weekend I experimented with soft ground. This is like hard ground except it has a greasy substance added such as tallow, Vaseline, or even grease. While it does dry, it stays soft and a bit sticky. Hard ground is usually removed with an etching needle and creates well defined and clean lines. If on the other hand you press something into the soft ground (paper, leaf, fabric, etc.) by running it through the press the soft ground will stick to it. When the article is removed it will have pressed through the soft ground to the plate in varying degrees depending on the texture of the article and that texture will expose parts of the plate in its likeness.

Soft ground was perhaps most common in the latter half of the 18th century and first half of the 19th. Traditionally it was used with paper and pencil. A piece of paper is laid over the soft-grounded plate and the drawing made directly onto the paper. The lines produced after etching are soft-edged, like charcoal or crayon. I was really intrigued by the idea of making a plate of an object such as a leaf or feather. I've seen work like this and it reminds me of fossils. It's somewhat haunting, somewhat surreal, impressionistic and moody. I like it.

I went outside and picked a few end branches off the Evergreen tree next to the house. I then had to experiment for quite a while to get the combination of pressure, wax and blotting paper, and blankets to work. I also had to trim the needles off to get a basically two-dimensional flat object that would lay flat and not overwhelm the image by being too dense. This required certain artistic decisions as to how much was too much and where exactly to remove and where to leave alone. Even so, the first several trials on brass key tags produced squashed pine needles, torn waxed paper, pine-juice scented blotting paper, and no need for air freshener. But finally I got it and ran a prepared 16 gauge 2" x 4" copper plate through the press. This was another piece of the old letterpress half-tone I was given. I had to fleck off a few errant pieces of pine needles but it looked pretty good.

I laid the plate in the mordant and a new guessing game ensued: how long to leave it in. This was even more difficult to judge than the line drawing I did on the hard grounded plate the week before. In that case at least all the lines were going to be etched to the same depth. Here they would vary because of the nature of the texture to be reproduced. In the end I left it there for about 20 minutes, checking twice during that time. For the most part I think I got it right. At least I was personally happy with it for my first time.


It was then on to pulling a few proofs and as you can see from the photos I tried it with two kinds of paper. The first type of paper was my old standby unknown brand, approx. 20 lb. laid paper. Since it's the only etching ink I have I used Graphic Chemical Bone Black. I did the final wipe with my hand. I apologize for the poor scans which show strange horizontal lines and make it look like the plate mark is smashed, etc. Once I get a decent digital camera I'll take nice photos instead.


The second proof was done on Graphic Chemical's 150 lb. cotton rag house paper, a few sheets of which I purchased to try out. Again, I used the Bone Black ink. I did the final wipe with old newspaper to get a cleaner background. That rotten scan again! There are no horizontal lines on the actual proof.

I'm not sure whether I like the hand wipe or the paper wipe better; each has its merits I suppose. I'm certain to do a lot of experimenting and of course I'm hoping my technique will improve which will have its own affect. I admit to being very pleased with the way the plate turned out, also somewhat astonished. At some point I will print an "edition" but for now I'm still learning and experimenting.

Etch-A-Sketch Redux

Hibernation continues as does my experimentation with intaglio printing. There are several intaglio processes, one of which is etching. I got some etching supplies last week and made my first etched plate today. The image is of an actual grave stone in a very secluded, wooded area in Rockland County, NY. I did grave stone rubbings a number of years ago when I was living in that area and found this grave in a graveyard in the middle of nowhere.

The plate is 1/16" x 3" x 4" cut from an old letterpress half-tone plate. The former front of that plate is now the back, of course. I'll be buying proper plates in the future but a friend of mine generously gave me some of these that his father had kept for years as scrap metal. They were long since useless for their intended purpose but work great for practice here. They do have some issues and I cleaned and flattened what is now the face but without going to Herculean efforts. For the moment they're more than satisfactory.

I brushed shellac on the back since I wanted to save money and not buy asphaltum or use the hard ground that is used on the front of the plate for this purpose and because I had plenty of shellac. I then brushed hard ground on the face and let it dry overnight.

I drew the image on paper with a No. 2 pencil and I laid this upside down on the plate, wrapped it around the back and taped it. I then put it through the Kelton press and removed the paper. Even though the ground was quite dark the graphite adhered and the image showed up very clear and sharp. Using a medium-sized needle I made, I needled the image on the plate.

I laid the plate face down at an angle in a glass baking dish. I was using ferric chloride instead of acid so while I didn't need a feather to brush away the bubbles I had to allow for the dissolving copper to drop off the plate and not hinder the etching process by filling the etched lines. I had read different things about how much time to allow for the etching. After 15 minutes I pulled the plate out and checked it but couldn't really tell what was happening. I placed it back in the dish and found the old enlarger lens that I often use for a loop. I pulled it out again and then could see that it was working. I put it back in and after a total of about a half hour took it out and rinsed it off in water. I was surprised how nice, at least to my eyes, it looked.

I couldn't wait to print a couple proofs with it and the results are below.

The first proof was on the unknown, approx. 20 lb. cotton laid paper I've been using up until now since I have a bunch of it I got for free. Note the dark vertical lines where the ferric chloride bit slightly through the hard ground. Next time I will have to pay more careful attention. The brushing left light and dark streaks, thicker and thinner, even though the coverage was complete.

For this next I wiped the plate cleaner and the vertical lines did not show up as much. Unfortunately I've found that scanning these prints instead of photographing them shows unsightly things that are not visible when looking at them directly. Not to mention that my scanner leaves strange horizontal lines in the image. But until I can get a decent camera this will have to do.

This last was with another more cleanly wiped plate but this time I used a heavier paper, 150 lb cotton rag. This is Graphic Chemical's "house paper" and aside from the fact that it is pretty inexpensive, seems to do a pretty nice job. Of course, I have little experience with which to really evaluate it against other papers. I didn't allow it to soak long enough and it did not press into the plate as well as it should have. Next time I'll remember...that and many other things I didn't take into account. Like the blobs of ink I missed on the edge of the plate on the last proof!

I'm teaching myself how to do all this and so far I'm rather pleased with the result.

What’s The Buzz?

I’ll tell you what’s happening: printing. Yes, after a period of high stress at work that hasn’t actually ended I’ve gotten myself in the swing of things again, cleaned up the shop, and got the press running. A number of projects are now back on track including the upcoming first issue of my journal, otherwise known as a ‘zine for you non-hipsters. And that bit of news leads me to the events of today.

Friend-of-mine and very creative and talented artist Rachael Faillace expresses herself in many ways and I highly recommend you check out her website to see for yourself: http://www.rachaelfaillace.com/. I want to include original artwork in my journal and I asked Rachael if she would contribute a linoleum block print. The idea was that she would provide the cut image and I would mount it type high and print it. That way I could incorporate the cut in one of the two-page forms. She very graciously agreed and the result appeared in my mailbox a few weeks later. She had been working in her garden one afternoon and the bees flying from flower to flower inspired her. As planned, I made a cherry base for it at work and mounted the cut.

Today I printed the cut for the first time and the result can be seen above and I really love it. This is the first time I’ve printed a linoleum block since elementary school. I know it’s a common practice to print them with a platen press but I had several concerns. One was over the ink. Block printing ink sold for this kind of printing is different from the rubber and oil base ink used for letterpress and I don’t have any and didn’t really want to buy any. I also wasn’t sure how the linoleum would handle the strength of the impression and thought I might find myself in limbo, printing too lightly but not being able to increase the impression for fear of damaging the linoleum.

Of course, as is so often the case with premeditated fears, they were unfounded in the event. In fact, the block printed surprisingly well, at least to my eyes. The image itself is about 2” x 2 1/2”. I decided on a yellow colored cover stock and it so happened I had some pre-cut scraps from a print shop I help clean out. I believe it’s about 80 pound stock. So the final sheet is 3 7/8” x 4 ½”. Remember: never turn down free paper.

I’ll describe my basic procedure in case that might be helpful to anyone. If I had a decent camera I’d have taken a few photos. Oh, well. First I got the dirty work out of the way and oiled and wiped down the press. Then I redressed the platen with a new top sheet. Except in very rare instances I always replace the top sheet for each job. That way I’m always sure it’s clean and flat. My tympan paper at .012” is thicker than what is most often sold today which is .006” thick. When I got my first press and most of the contents of an old print shop there was a partial roll and one new, unwrapped roll. I haven’t seen the need to get something thinner and it actually works very well as it holds any kind of gauge pin very firmly and lays flat and tight.

After that I went to the stone and locked up the cut using a spider chase to save a bit of time by using less furniture. I prefer using the chaser method of lockup as I think it’s more secure, especially with type. I snugged the quoins, planed the form, tightened the quoins the rest of the way. I checked to make sure they weren’t overly tight and had sprung the chase by trying to rock the chase from corner to corner. Finally, while not as critical as it would be with type, I checked for lift.

I put the rollers on the press, taking a chance by only using two for no other reason other than it would be one less to clean. I wiped a dab of ink, in this case Van Son rubber base black, across the ink disc with an ink spatula and then ran the press to distribute the ink. Then in went the chase and I pulled an impression on the top sheet. I always pull an impression on the top sheet for setting the gauge pins. I wipe the wet ink off with a rag and mineral spirits and then a bit of talcum powder (actually baby powder from the grocery store). It’s then very easy to measure out the margins directly on the top sheet and draw lines to place the gauge pins. I find this method to be fast and accurate. I laid out my margins by measuring the height and width of the image and the height and width of the paper. I subtracted the one from the other for each dimension and then divided by two. That gave me my top/bottom and side margins. I drew a line directly along the lower edge of the image on the top sheet and then did the same thing along the top edge of the image using a drafting square. Then I measured off the margins I had worked out and drew lines parallel to the first two the width of the margins apart. Those were the lines I would use to set my gauge pins.

I generally use McGill’s double-grip pins so after placing a sacrificial piece of pressboard under the top sheet I used a makeready knife (basically an X-Acto knife) to cut an approx. 1” slit. Then I inserted the pins, lined them up with the layout lines, and tightened them in place. I removed the sacrificial pressboard and placed a sheet of the stock I was going to print in the gauge pins. I use the sacrificial pressboard so I can easily press through the top sheet with the knife without damaging the pressboard in my packing which I reuse as many times as possible. Waste not; want not.

I set the grippers; in this case one would be able to hold down the right side but the left gripper had to stay to the outside of the far left gauge pin. So to help strip the sheet off the form I ran a rubber band between the grippers so it would lie across the top portion of the sheet in the margin area. Turning the flywheel by hand I cycled the press through slowly and pulled an impression on the test sheet. This also made sure that the packing was not too thick and showed me on the test print that I wouldn’t need to make any further adjustments. I adjusted the left gauge pin slightly and pulled another proof.

Thus did the printing commence.

"You may fire when you are ready, Gridley."

This is about my first broadside and my first-time participation in a letterpress swap. In the spirit of Commodore Dewey, the printing of this innocuous sheet was something of an epic battle. Before the swap was a glimmer in any one's eye, about a year ago I decided I would try and print one of my favorite poems as a broadside. That was back when I had my C&P 8x12 with the poor rollers and worse Morgan Expansion truck tires. It was the first form of any length I had set.


My concept was to create a broadside in the style of the 17th century following examples I had seen. Thus the black letter Old English text and the Caslon title. The border was not exactly in a style of that age but was the closest I had. I picked a Strathmore all-cotton laid paper I got with the press along with most of the original equipment for my shop.


A number of problems cropped up right away, things that had not been so evident on the small forms I had printed to that point such as a business card. First was the roller and truck issue as it affected inking the form. The perf cuts in the rollers were bad at one place and created a white line that moved around slightly. The truck tires being out of round caused their own difficulties. And to add insult to injury I realized that the platen I had so carefully adjusted needed tweaking. I could deal with the platen but had to live with the rollers and trucks for the time being, not being able to afford replacements. The texture of the laid paper did not help. But for all of those things, it ironically still printed as good as some of the cheap and quickly printed originals I've seen. It was certainly readable, if no acme of the printer's art.


Fast forward to the present day and the advent of my great 10x15 press with good rollers and steel trucks. Now you would think hey, now we're cooking with gas, right? Well, sort of. Everything certainly went much better and the print was far superior. But the fly in the ointment was that I had taped the rails to get the rollers adjusted and had been pretty happy with the business cards I had done but I should really have taken more time to experiment. I had signed up for a great letterpress swap (letterpressswap.blogspot.com) and was pressed for time (no pun intended) so even though they did not come out as well as I would have liked and as the press is capable, they're OK.


What I needed to do and have subsequently done is to remove a couple layers of tape from each rail so the rollers would press a bit more into the form. Once I did that I got great inking and nice prints without makeready using the same form. Not that it couldn't have used a touch of makeready here and there to really get it just right. The type was a bit worn and though I replaced a number of sorts it could have used a little onionskin here and there. So the moral of this story is to take your time and go the extra mile.


As my first real project I was reasonably satisfied and I learned a good deal more about what constitutes basic adjustments. You can see the results for yourself below. Wild exclamations of approbation and constructive criticisms are welcome.

Hooked On Wingnuts

In my last post I neglected to explain that the screw hooks are fixed to the bottom board with nuts and washers, the nuts on the bottom being countersunk into the board so the bottom board sits flat on the base. The screw hooks in the top board are loose in their holes and each has a washer and wingnut. Once the top board is laid on the stack of pads each length of chain is attached to the hooks in the top and bottom boards with as little slack as possible. The stack is then compressed by tightening the wingnuts evenly on both sides.

Now go and do thou likewise!

A Pressing Issue

I make up my notepads using a padding press and padding cement. These presses come in various shapes, sizes, and types of construction but they all do basically the same thing: compress the stacked pads so the flexible padding cement can be applied and so that the pads will maintain a compact form and the sheets hold together well once released and cut apart for use.

I made my own press modeling it on a style once commonly available from most printing supply houses and still available in one form or another, even on Ebay. The biggest difference is that I made mine from scrap lumber and plywood and it cost me nothing but time and a couple bucks for the two pieces of chain and the screw hooks.

The press consists of a base, a removable vertical backboard, a bottom board and a top board. You can see most of these parts in the photo. The photo is from last year and shows my original pads. To use it you stand the backboard on the base and lay the bottom board on the base. After first folding the edge of a sheet of index and laying it on the bottom board, you take a stack or stacks of pads (whatever will fit depending on the size of the press or pads) and place them on the bottom board with the top of the pads against the backboard. The pads of course have already been made up by interspersing a piece of chipboard alternately between the number of sheets each pad will have. You jog the stack so it is nice and square and the sheets are even all around. Then another sheet of index is folded and laid on top of the pads after which the top board is put on, the chains connected to the screw hooks, and the wing nuts tightened to squeeze the stack of pads. How much they should be squeezed depends on how tall the stack is but there's a lot of "that seems about right" involved.

The top and bottom boards with the pads in between can then be lifted up as one unit and turned around on the base so that the tops of the stacked pads are facing you. The sheets of index can be folded up and down out of the way. They are there to prevent padding cement from getting all over the boards.

As might be expected from the name, padding cement is a special adhesive used for pads. It is sort of rubber-like when it dries and I'm sure everyone has used a pad at one time or another and so is at least familiar with it in a user's sense. It can be purchased from printer's supply houses, art suppliers, etc. It's available in a few colors though white seems to be the most common. The cement I have is water-based and I just take a cheap brush and paint on the cement making sure to work it in well so I don't miss any spots. I let it dry and then put on a second coat. Most people probably use just one coat but I like two for strength. Another way to strengthen the top is to press cheesecloth over the first coat while it is wet and then paint on a second coat.

In a pinch, the pads can be stacked on the edge of a table and a brick or two laid on top to prepare for the cement. This is the method given in an older graphic arts textbook I have. But I like the surety and stability of the press.

Once the cement is completely dry (I leave it overnight) I cut the pads apart with a wide-bladed knife. There's a bit of a technique to this which is easily learned by doing it a few times and after which you can slice them up like butta.

Pads are easy, cheap, and a great project and always seem to be a big hit with everyone I give them to. Obviously they can also be used in business-like ways for advertising, etc. I would only add that you need a lot of sheets to make them. I printed almost 600 sheets on my last pad project which yielded 17 pads of about 35 sheets each. So you Vandercook users may want to pay a visit to your friend's motorized platen press. Heidelburg owners are in luck.

Noteworthy

I finished the run for the new pad sheets today, about 600 in all. That's the longest print run I've done to date and it went very well. Among other things, doing some of these mundane print projects gives a lot of practise feeding the press. If I haven't mentioned it before, I run the press at 14 impressions per minute which is very comfortable for me. The experiment of leaving the Van Son rubber base ink on the press overnight was successful also. I know this is "common knowledge" but it's nice to have it verified by my own experience. The top photo shows my first pads which I printed on my old 8x12 about a year ago. The bottom photo shows the revised heading. I not only like that heading better but they printed somewhat better as well, though I'm not sure how much of the difference can be seen in the scans. I'll be gluing them up in the next day or two. It's a simple and fun project and besides the potential advertising value they make great gifts and are useful to have around. I made them using offset paper cut offs so they basically cost me only my time. The faces are Old English, Caslon, and Stymie.

Saturday Night’s Alright For Printing

While working on several larger projects still in the design stage I’ve been printing some more mundane items. I ran off some more business cards and this evening I reset the form for the heading on my notepads and started printing them. I’ll finish the run tomorrow and then start gluing them up.

I thought I would record how I did these, which will show my usual procedure for setting the gauge pins and grippers, among other things. I have been forced to return to the use of my vintage digital camera so please excuse the poor quality of the photos.

The first photo shows the locked up form in the press. I invariably use the chaser method as shown. Because these pads are basically the same as printing a letterhead, the head of the form is at the bottom of the chase and slightly below center. This will allow better inking of the form and more even pressure. The pads are 5” x 8” and about 1” of the sheet stuck out the top of the platen.

The second photo shows the topsheet after the gauge pins have been set. Note that I like to use the McGill double-grip pins, as they are not only easy to set but easy to adjust. I’ve used the spring type before and have a few other kinds including the quad type for certain circumstances. I’m also fortunate in having a set of McGill extension gauge pins which hang off the lower bail, extending below the platen and thereby allowing especially large sheets to be held and printed.

Once my basic packing is set I usually pull an impression on the topsheet using a piece of old-style carbon paper. Normally ink would be used but I’ve found that I’m usually not printing on the same day I’m dressing the platen and getting things ready for a print run. So the carbon paper let’s me print on the topsheet without inking up the press. For those times when I am printing the same day, I pull an impression with ink and then wipe the ink off with a rag and mineral spirits, drying it with baby powder.

The print looks a little light in the photo but the entire form is actually visible. Using a line gauge I drew a line across top of the form. Using a drafting triangle along that line I drew the other line along the left side of the print. I had determined on a layout sheet what margins I wanted and so measured out that distance at two points along each of those two initial lines. Then I drew lines connecting those marks as shown. Then I attached the gauge pins to the top sheet. The double-grip pins require a single slit in the paper to insert the tongue that I cut with a make ready knife. To avoid damaging the pressboard, which I reuse as many times as possible, I inserted under the topsheet an old pressboard saved for just this purpose. Once the cuts are made I remove that board and set the pins as you can see in the photo. Using a sheet of the same stock I’m going to use for the run I take a trial impression, check the margins, and adjust the gauge pins accordingly.

The third photo shows the setup for the grippers. I set the right gripper so it would cover the right side of the sheet and the left gripper far enough over to put some stretch into the rubber bands and generally keep out of the way. I used two rubber bands stretched between the grippers, one at about the center of the sheet and one towards the bottom, i.e. the top of the platen. In combination with the gripper tongues, this proved to work fine.

The fourth photo shows the delivery board towards the end of the run with some of the printed sheets. It also shows a magnifying glass and four rubber fingertips. I kept an eye on the prints and noted when they seemed to print lightly. I then threw off the impression and looked at the print with the glass. Usually my eyesight was proven correct and I had to add some ink to the press. I got the fingertips from Staples and use them in place of the traditional glycerin and/or sandpaper rubber-banded to the fingertips. I put one on the index and middle finger of each hand. They really work great. You can move sheets around with a very light touch and help keep the sheets clean.

The last photo is simply an overall view of the press after I finished the run. I still have about 300 more to do but will wait until tomorrow. This is also an experiment since I’ve left the Van Son rubber-base ink on the press. I’ve never done this before and tried to print the next day though it’s supposed to be OK. We’ll see.

Once the sheets dry I’ll scan a good copy and show you the results. By the way, note the long ink fountain on the press. I finally got this cleaned up and mounted. I’ll take better photos and post them another time.

It Ain’t Over ‘til It’s Over

A week ago last Sunday I printed my first real project. It was for a letterpress swap and only ran to about 75 sheets but was the first thing I’ve printed in “bulk” for distribution. Everything came out reasonably well and I was very happy with the way the press worked. During this process I learned, or perhaps was reminded of something, I thought I’d share here.

I made a previous post describing how I adjusted the platen on my press at the time I restored it. I adjusted it at all four corners using a machinist’s gauge and I spent considerable time loosing and tightening the platen bolts until everything was set to the gauge. And in fact when I printed a small business card form, it was just fine.

When dressing the platen and before inking the press my practice has been to use a sheet of the old-style dark blue/purple “carbon” paper with a test sheet to pull a proof, turning the flywheel over by hand while holding the two sheets between the platen and the form. Once I’m sure everything is where it should be I ink the press and pull an impression on the tympan that I then use to set the gauge pins following the usual procedure.

The form for my project had a printed area of about 4” x 6”. I had locked it up in the chase slightly below the centerline as is normally recommended. When I pulled the proof using the carbon the impression, while generally even, was lighter at the top than the bottom. For a second I was surprised considering the care I had used setting the platen. But then I realized that an actual form introduces a variable and especially the size of the form.

The answer was to adjust the top two platen bolts very, very slightly to move the top of the platen towards the bed. I then took a trial impression and made another very small adjustment until the impression was truly equal. In fact, the impression was so good that I didn’t feel I needed makeready and so proceeded with the run. Looking back I think there were one or two things I would have spotted-up but in general I was satisfied with the impression. I saved my proofs and will scan them and a copy of the final print and post them tomorrow when I have more time.

So while gauges provide a useful starting point the proof, as always, is in the printing.


Followup: Just to be clear, once I get the platen properly set, and I'm hoping that has now been achieved, I don't expect to have to adjust it again except in extraordinary circumstances. But having recently disassembled, cleaned, reassembled and initially adjusted everything, I'm not surprised it required a bit more tweeking.

The usual means of adjusting the platen is to lock up either four large sorts, one in each corner, or a foundry type border all around the edge of the chase. Then test proofs are taken on the tympan and adjustments made accordingly. I have nothing against that method but when I tried it on my old 8x12 I personally didn't have much success. When I made the adjustment with the method I've also now used on my 10x15 things worked out very well.