Mold numbers looking for info on what there use was?

[bucky902]

Was it just to ID the mold it self, for the blower that made the bottle or for the buyers ID ?

 

[RED Matthews]

Hello Steven, I can help you a lot if your still learning about bottles. I have collected them for 77 years and worked in the management and engineering of Thatcher Glass, Elmira NY Central Mold Shop - for 15 of those years, and traveled the world for over 20 years selling metal castings to the glass companies. The molds for a set of a particular plants production plant would have enough to cover an eight section double or triple gob machine. In today's glass multiple section machines even more would be made in a set. So an eight section double gob machine set up could be delivered with enough molds to cover the machines running the job in sets that had the mold numbers 1 to maybe 30 on each mold and on the bottom of the bottom plate flange, so the machine mold hangers would have a matching three part mold set up. I don't know what other way to explain the objective and need for the mold numbers.Most bottle molds at that time we made of a cast iron from Kelly Foundry, in West Virginia. The molds were cast against an iron cavity form, to chill the cast iron to a dendritic carbon structure in the first half of cavity; that would reduce the heat transfer speed in the iron cavity when the hot glass was blown against the chilled iron of the cavity. In my home page I described this function which was to reduce the heat transfer of the mold metal next to the cavity. Without that extra heat, the bottle would have thick and thin glass, that occurred in older iron mold bottles, that would have that condition, which was what we collectors used to call whittle. So if you have questions - pass them on. RED Matthews

 

[bucky902]

Thank you RED Matthews so if i am reading right it is all to do with the molds ID nothing else.

 

[RED Matthews]

YES The molds were made in sets - and the number of them was dependent on the glass machine the were to go on. Glass machines were made with individual sections, making the bottle job. It could have 8 sections and if it was double gob, that would mean that iit took 16 molds to load the machine. I also required stand-by molds for changing, if there was a mold in trouble, that had to be changed out for repair - or what ever. So a job for that mach9ne might have 24 molds to cover it. If two machines were running the same job, then there would be another set.It is quite a job to control and supply every machine for a factory. RED Mathews