Pickle jar (?) with manufacturing flaw

[Wheelah23]

I found this in my dump yesterday. I believe it's circa 1900-1905. It's a ground lip screw top jar. It seems to be in the horseradish/pickle jar shape.

It's embossed "T. H. DEYO/ NEWARK, N.J." on two of its panels. It's octagonal. There's two curious things about it.

First of all, I already had a very similarly shaped bottle, except that one is an early machine made bottle. They were probably manufactured within 10 years of each other. The funny thing is, the one I already had is embossed "W.B. DEYO/ NEW YORK". Obviously the companies are related in some way. My guess is that "T. H. DEYO" was the original company owner. Maybe he died, and his son/brother inherited the company. Maybe they then moved their operations to New York as their business grew. This is all just conjecture, by the way...

New is on the left, it has a ground lip.

The second thing is that the new addition has a strange manufacturing flaw inside it. It's a large, thick ripple in the glass that starts below the shoulder and goes diagonally all the way to the bottle's lip. The outside is normal, except for a crescent moon, fingernail size/shaped indent in the glass right where the irregularity starts. I don't know what to call this flaw except a ripple.

Here are some pictures of it:

 

[Wheelah23]

Here is the shape of the ripple

 

[Wheelah23]

Hee-haw

 

[Wheelah23]

What would cause such a thing?

 

[Dansalata]

DONT KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT EM, BUT VERYCOOL

 

[RED Matthews]

Hello Wheelah23. This is what is left of a spike or a bird-swing. Because of it's location on the side of the jar, I can't be sure. These problems plagued the press ware industry for several years.

Basically the jars are made in the press and blow method, where the parison shape is created in the first mold (what was called the blank mold) and it was responsible for the shape of the parison that was needed to make good distribution of glass thickness, in the final blow mold. The inside of the parison was made using a plunger that was shaped with a curved profile from the neck-ring to the tip of the plunger. This plunger stuck up through the neckring and the gob of glass was delivered, into the blank mold cavity from the machines feeder system. This gob of glass was the right amount to make the complete bottle.

When it dropped into the blank mold the top of the mold was closed with a baffle and the plunger was pushed up into the blank mold to shape the inside of the parison form. These plungers got very hot being pushed into the core of the glass gob. They were cooled by a cooler tube that was machined to a shape that could get compressed air inside of it and it was delivered out through drilled holes to cool the inside of the plunger. They had some some strange shapes to force the air out to the contour of the plungers inside contour. That contour closely matched the contour of the plungers out side. The cooler also was shaped to get the air out to the plunger core for cooling. If the tip of the plunger got too hot the glass would stick to it and pull down a spike inside the parison. This spike then formed when the plunger pulled back down, created a spike inside the parison. Those spikes could even end up standing in the bottom of the jar being made.

In the process of transferring the parison from the blank side to the final mold side, the parison had to be inverted to let the transfer bead hold the parison when the final mold closed around it. Both of your jars have a transfer bead, but the one with the ground finish was the oldest one made. When the parison was inverted - if the glass was too hot, the parison could collapse enough to let the two inside surfaces touch. If they did - this would stretch in the final blow to create a bird-swing across the jar, on the inside. This is what I think happened in yours.

I worked on these problems extensively, changing machining methods and changing cooler designs that went inside the plungers. We changed the coolers from shapes that were machined from solid bar stock (Cold Rolled Steel) to Oil Can Spouts that I bought from the Eagle Brand Oil Can Company. This let us put more air up into the plungers and helped. I even started a company called GLISCO Glass Industry Supply Company, to get better cooling tubes. The oil can spouts had a linear bonded seam, on them when they were rolled. When we increased the air pressure in the cooler - it would split the tubes. The GLISCO tubes were swagged to form and could stand up to the pressure.

At one point I was having plungers investment cast with cooling fins inside the cavity of the plunger. Collectively we pretty much solved the problems and made successful jars without spikes and bird-swings.

The glass companies developed great electronic scanning methods that kept these anomalies from getting out to the consumers. After all, a broken spike or bird swing, that broke on filling, could be a very liable health hazard to the swallower.

I hope this helps you know what your jar has. If you want to part with it - I would like it for show and tell when I am visiting local bottle clubs to cover subjects like this. RED Matthews

 

[Wheelah23]

ORIGINAL: RED Matthews

Hello Wheelah23.  This is what is left of a spike or a bird-swing.  Because of it's location on the side of the jar, I can't be sure.  These problems plagued the press ware industry for several years. 

Basically the jars are made in the press and blow method, where the parison shape is created in the first mold (what was called the blank mold) and it was responsible for the shape of the parison that was needed to make good distribution of glass thickness, in the final blow mold.  The inside of the parison was made using a plunger that was shaped with a curved profile from the neck-ring to the tip of the plunger.  This plunger stuck up through the neckring and the gob of glass was delivered, into the blank mold cavity from the machines feeder system.  This gob of glass was the right amount to make the complete bottle.

When it dropped into the blank mold the top of the mold was closed with a baffle and the plunger was pushed up into the blank mold to shape the inside of the parison form.  These plungers got very hot being pushed into the core of the glass gob.  They were cooled by a cooler tube that was machined to a shape that could get compressed air inside of it and it was delivered out through drilled holes to cool the inside of the plunger.  They had some some strange shapes to force the air out to the contour of the plungers inside contour.  That contour closely matched the contour of the plungers out side.  The cooler also was shaped to get the air out to the plunger core for cooling.  If the tip of the plunger got too hot the glass would stick to it and pull down a spike inside the parison.  This spike then formed when the plunger pulled back down, created a spike inside the parison.  Those spikes could even end up standing in the bottom of the jar being made. 

In the process of transferring the parison from the blank side to the final mold side, the parison had to be inverted to let the transfer bead hold the parison when the final mold closed around it.  Both of your jars have a transfer bead, but the one with the ground finish was the oldest one made.  When the parison was inverted - if the glass was too hot, the parison could collapse enough to let the two inside surfaces touch.  If they did - this would stretch in the final blow to create a bird-swing across the jar, on the inside.  This is what I think happened in yours.

I worked on these problems extensively, changing machining methods and changing cooler designs that went inside the plungers.  We changed the coolers from shapes that were machined from solid bar stock (Cold Rolled Steel) to Oil Can Spouts that I bought from the Eagle Brand Oil Can Company.  This let us put more air up into the plungers and helped.  I even started a company called GLISCO  Glass Industry Supply Company, to get better cooling tubes.  The oil can spouts had a linear bonded seam, on them when they were rolled.  When we increased the air pressure in the cooler - it would split the tubes.  The GLISCO tubes were swagged to form and could stand up to the pressure. 

At one point I was having plungers investment cast with cooling fins inside the cavity of the plunger.  Collectively we pretty much solved the problems and made successful jars without spikes and bird-swings.

The glass companies developed great electronic scanning methods that kept these anomalies from getting out to the consumers.  After all, a broken spike or bird swing, that broke on filling, could be a very liable health hazard to the swallower.  

I hope this helps you know what your jar has.  If you want to part with it - I would like it for show and tell when I am visiting local bottle clubs to cover subjects like this.  RED Matthews

Thanks for that information! I am not looking to sell it.

But I thought birdswings went from one side of the bottle to another. Mine is more like an uneven thickness that changes abruptly at that point. On either immediate side of the ripple, the glass has very different thickness. One side is thin, and on the opposite side of the ripple, it is much thicker. Around the rest of the jar, the thickness slowly rises/falls, depending on which side you go from.

Also, your explanation is talking about machine made jars. Mine has a ground lip. I thought that meant it was mouth blown? Just trying to learn more about bottle manufacturing.

 

[RED Matthews]

Also, your explanation is talking about machine made jars. Mine has a ground lip. I thought that meant it was mouth blown? Just trying to learn more about bottle manufacturing.

Well I just got back from supper and read your reply. The bird swing pull can be blown up against the jar making it thicker. They are all different. I had one setting on my desk at Thatcher Glass. I was going to get a little paper bird made by one of those Japanese paper folders and glue it to the swing. The VP of Mfg. came in - saw it - picked it up and smashed in on the floor by my chair. He said he didn't want one seen in his factory.

Also regarding the quote above. A lot of early jars were made in molds on the ABM; where the thread was machined in the top diameter of the mold. I think these were described as full height molds. The top sealing glass had to be ground flat on those jars.

In this case I am sure the mold seam went all the way up over the threaded formed glass.

Anytime you have a question - feel free to send me an email. <bottlemysteries@yahoo.com> RED Matthews