Spent $230 on a lying press and it was worth every cent

Picked up a secondhand lying press at an estate sale near Dayton last month. I had been fighting with warped boards and loose joints on a few projects, using clamps and weights. This thing flattened a 400 page text block overnight with zero fuss. My only regret is not buying one sooner. Has anyone else had luck with older presses or did I get lucky?

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richard_shah3d ago

That Dayton score sounds like the kind of find that makes the whole hobby feel worth it. I paid $180 for a beat-up old cast iron one from a flea market in Cincinnati and it took me a weekend to clean off the rust, but once I did, it was a total game changer. The weight and even pressure beat any clamp setup I ever tried, especially for thick books where the spine always wanted to bow out. What I learned is that the older ones have better geometry, the platen stays level even when you crank down hard, and that makes all the difference for gumming or casing in. You might want to oil the screw threads with a light machine oil now and then, mine started squeaking after a few months and that fixed it right up. Honestly, if you can find one under $250 and it ain't cracked, grab it without thinking twice.