I worked in direct mail for over 25 years. I would be a wealthy guy if I got paid 50¢ for every piece I ran through a Phillipsburg inserter! I usually ran larger 6-station (feeder) machines. I also ran a Mastermailer, also by Phillipsburg, but ran 9x12 outside envelopes. The double detector will also "trip" if a station doesn't feed an insert. I have also run #10s on a Pitney Bowes inserter and labeled mail pieces on a Kirk Rudy Labeling machine. I also ran a Baum folder also made by Bell & Howell. I also worked as an inhouse service tech and maintained all the equipment. I totally loved the job! Thanks for the video!
I worked for Bell & Howell in Miami, 81-84, and I installed and/or serviced dozens of these machines, and the really big AIM machines. Great job setting it up and going through the operation! Brings back good (and sometimes bad, if the machine broke down) memories! Cheers!
I was a maintenance tech on these B&H machines for 20 years. (not through B&H though) Ours were very similar to yours and even older. We had several machines that were 28 stations, an 18 station, and a 10 station that was very old. I've had to completely disassemble to bare frames and rebuild them. They are fun to work on. One tip about the double detecting is to set the misfeed first. It changes the position of where the double feed arm will contact. Your machine looks to run very nice and smooth. Nice to see these still in action.
I run newer mail insertion machines for a printing company. They’re all computers and sensors now. This reminds me of a Bell & Howell that’s at its end of life that I’ve been wanting the older machine operators to teach me. So cool!
Just got a job working in a print shop and we have a similar Bell and Howell from 1973 - what an amazing machine! I've been having so much fun running it and tweaking it for each job. Thanks for the video, definitely some good points!!
Dan: Playing back from 14:25 at 0.5 (half speed) is ABSOLUTELY fascinating and addicting to watch! THANK YOU for fantastic video angles and a lot of time editing these videos together! A MASTERS course in Printing Technology, Mechanics and POSITIVE ATTITUDE!
I love the mechanical nature of this machine :-) I could watch this thing run all day! I too got tired of hand stuffing & picked up a Neopost 3 station inserter, but I wish I could get my hands on one of these. Thanks for sharing.
Nicely done. I'm one of those people who service those machines (not a B&H guy, my company is 3rd party). That machine is in very nice shape, running beautifully. Thanks for a great video.
The Bell & Howell Phillipsburg envelope inserter is a nice fixture for any print shop or office. Daniel, you are blessed to own that machine! I hope you have it for more years to come.
I have been in the print and mail industry managing a fulfillment center for nearly 10 years now. We have been using Pitney Bowes Di950 inserters with relay 7000 base units which are a bit different from this machine. It is extremely fascinating to me to see what an inserting machine used to be. Thank you very much for taking the time to show this amazing piece of machinery.
People stopped using these envelope stacker's eventually as they got fingers caught in them. they started using a delivery belt eventually. also in the UK, they require a guard at the front so you can't get your arm or finger caught in the swinging arm system. I first used one of these in early '84 and we still have one in our factory today tho we now mainly use Bhurs BB300 and Bhurs BB600's. A lovely walk down memory lane, thank you
Wow this brought memories back. Worked with this about 20 years ago shortly after leaving school. Used to work on a machine exactly like this but with 8 inserts. Rarely had a job for 8 inserts though, most was about 6 inserts. Used to have it going at real fast speeds. Tiniest little tweaks required at the start of the mail job running the machine ultra slow to see where I need to make adjustments, would do that for the first 10 minutes and then I'd crank the speed up as fast as the mail sorter could handle. The machine I worked with had a conveyor belt at the end and did not stack up like your machine. The trick with getting the machine not to pick doubles was to fan the paper out before loading it. Some inserts needed to loaded fully and other inserts such as thin glossy inserts would only need to be filled up to a fith of the way. Loved that vid. 😉👍
Dan is an exception.. He is highly mechanical and very astute and paper flow etc. I agree these machines have some of the longest longevity in the industry.. However, most people should look at getting a table top machine. A table top is most agreeable to most people. That said... No inserter is perfect..
As a production print technician who works on konica minolta I can say it has been busy this last couple of weeks. Non profit charities are doing their end of year fund raising. It is nice to see an old inserter still running.
@@justaprinter The problem is that they have Christmas at the wrong time of the year, when the shops are crowded and the mail system is stretched to the limit. They should have it mid-year when everything is much quieter 😎
I worked on this type of inserter and a few others as a maintenance mechanic for about 4 years so I know a lot about repairing them. When you break or wear out your first set of miter gears under the OME (outside mailing envelope) hopper let me know I can walk you thought it on how to change them with out losing the timing or resetting anything and have it running again like new in minutes. Retiming is a pain in the mule and can take a long time to get it right. Sometimes days until you finally find the sweet spot where everything runs like a watch again. This machine you get here is one of the easiest to work on. And yes keep it oiled the gripper chain and pusher chain links too. Also leaving it on the pallet is BRILLIANT, IF you have a fork lift that can place it on metal saw horses to work on if you ever need to go deep in to repairing. Trust me I KNOW what I'm talking about.
@@justaprinter Feel free too. I worked for R R Donnelly & Sons printing (now called something else) in there direct mail plants here in Green Bay and De Pere Wis. with some 25 or so inserters. I'll give a big heads up. These older mechanical inserters are by far better AND cheaper to run and maintain then the newer ones with servo motors and belts AND there speeds are not at all any faster. Plus when one of there computer mother board type thingy's dies your going to pay boo coo bucks paying a Tech guy to trouble shoot it than pay boo coo bucks for a new one then wait for it to ship to you and I can go on and on and on. You'll be pulling your hair out working on one of those pieces of crap. These older inserters ARE better engineered. Keep it simple you'll be glad you did. Lastly I may have mentioned this but keep them oiled. Go around and hit every zert you can see at least once a month and if you run 24/7 once a week. Keeping both the gripper and pusher chains nicely oiled will make them last a whole lot longer too. They WILL stretch out over time oiling them will make them last like twice as long. Yes oil can be a bit messy but if you when that old girl to dance fluidly with no effort she's needs to be oiled regularly.
@@justaprinter Oil the inside of the gripper chain track guides too to make it last longer also a drop of oil right inside the gripper link itself for smoother opening of the jaw pusher arm (At some point your going to want to shock a pair of those too as the tips will wear out over time) . If you don't already have some gripper springs get some (2 each side of gripper) there going to break and when one breaks it's going to start missing OME's (outside mail envelope). Easiest way to install a new spring? A fishing line or something like that pulling the spring up to than on to the jaw pin AND than just pulling the line out of the spring hole. There is no better way of doing it than that. Miter gears? I've changed 100's of them.
I needed this Dan! I needed some mechanical stuff. (Recovering from COVID here, along with my 89 yo mom and my sister and brother-in-law.). We buried my 62yo sister on Wednesday, COVID+pneumonia.
Yep. You figured it out pretty good...... A couple of things I have learned in my running these things. The push pin at the envelope feeder which pushes the product into the gripper is far enough forward to make the envelope buckle. That allows a consistent position in the Gripper. Watch enough videos and you will see it from other shops. Your inserter has the envelope opener I prefer versus the swinging finger of death Lol.... You have a nice machine. I also have a Air-tube we can hook to house air if we have a thin 2 pager that just won't stop pulling doubles. Blast that bad boy in the front of the pile and problem solved.... Looking good Dan.....
Or buy a buhrs bb 300 with air nozzles on every feeder . These swing arms are fine when material is nice and perfectly flat ....bent stock and they become a pain in the ass ! These jobs your running would be enclosing at easily 5k on the belt minimum. # BB300 buhrs. One of the best mailing machine work horses on the market .
Dan my wife worked on these full time. I ran one here and there. They can be a pain. It’s all material and suckers if I remember right. But where I work now. We have kerns and blue crest inverters. They can do about 20k per hr. Great when they run. But with all the bells and whistles not as easy to trouble shoot.
I run Blue Crest machines and I believe I can run the one at 22,000/hr but when you’re inserting that many pieces I know we have to turn the speed down to about 14 or 15,000/hr. They are pretty impressive to watch, but can be a pain to run lol
Thank you so much. That was a fascinating insight to how this all comes together and nice to see you are taking notice of viewer's requests. I was initially confused about the envelope opener as I couldn't see how the brass piece at 7:04 could slide under the flap to open it and thought that the black metal plate was doing the job. Even at the 14:34 mark, it still looks like the envelopes are passing over the brass piece. It wasn't until I slowed the speed down to .5 that I realized that it is actually bending down the top edge of the envelope which raises the flap up enabling the black plate to force the flap right open. Clever. And some genius managed to construct this so that all of the moving parts work in sinc. Ingenious.
@@tassie7325 I believe it is just an electrical circuit. The open paper flap stops the contacts from coming together. When the flap is closed, the contacts connect and stop the machine.
I'd imagine that you sat down and just watched it filling envelopes the first time you ran it. It's mesmerizing. Also I notice that you always have to bring the mailing to the postoffice. In my country PostNL would come and pick it up.
The USPS will pickup mail if you have enough. The company I work for produces about half a million inserted mailpieces on a normal day. Sometimes a million a day on busier days. We have like 15 inserter machines (like huge versions of your machine) that can output at least 10,000 mailpieces an hour. The USPS sends multiple semi trucks every day to pick up that mail. We used to have a USPS employee working in our building to make sure all the mail was correct before the trucks picked it up. I think our operation is on the small side. Plenty of companies do much more mail than we do.
@mister kluge Wow. My contacts at bulk mail center have told me about big companies like that. Very interesting. I don't plan on getting to that level but who knows! Haha.
It's fascinating to watch an old machine inserts the prints into an envelope. We have an inserter from Quadient, along with some other mailing equipment that came from Anza Mailing Systems Inc. - they are all computers now!
Jog the inserter when the machine arms grab an insert and just slighty swing out then stop. Turn machine off in this position. The water brush will be down and all the springs will be in a relaxed state! 👍
Thank you so much Dan for another great video posting. This was so great that I found a machine just like it and bought it. Does anyone have or know of a way to purchase a "parts book" for this unit?
Wait, that button is blue, is it not? Amazing video btw! Love watching explanations about machined like this! Wish I could also do some printing like this, though I think I won't be able to do do. Not sure how one would start and from what I saw even manual machines (for example for perfect binding) seem quite expensive. However, I still think it would be a very interesting video to do. Perhaps you can make one where you talk about how one could get started small scale and stuff like that :)
@@justaprinter Maybe this year you will run this magic linotype? It will be extremely interesting. I have the impression that with time the linotype printing market will become. Everyone is already bored with the typesetting made on computers :-)
@@justaprinter Along with new ways to fail! Our machines, at my work, are all computerized as we need to scan barcodes and keep track of how much goes out, due to our client. However, this means when the interface software (or Windows) throws a fit, we have to restart the whole machine. Not fun when you're in the middle of a job, and the software gets unhappy and you have to restart.
Hi Dan, sorry this is not regarding your present vid, just wondering. Recently started my own print shop and just bought a C6000 with bin and booklet finisher. Just wanted to know your opinion on good or bad buy and what you think about the machine?
I have just started operating some of these machines and am struggling with some forms varying in size because of the folds being inconsistent. It is slowing us down and am looking for ideas on how to get it to stop picking up doubles and then not feeding at all. Any ideas?? Great video btw
Make sure the inserts are worked between your hands bending them slightly to create gaps so the machine can grab them. Also don't over fill the thin glossy inserts
@@justaprinter I work for B+H and we still have these legacy machines aside from newer models. Try flexing the stock prior to loading and it may grip better. Folding is a matter of small tolerances, you may have to play with it and adjust clearances/alignments as necessary. The subsequent models have a very pronounced and logical evolution (and yes sensors everywhere now - including on water levels... I think one of our guys turned the old brass reservoirs into stylish lamps!
If you have more than 4 pieces that need inserted, you can do this as long as one of them is a #9 envelope. Put the #9 on the main bin which is where the #10 is and rotate it so the flap is now on the back side towards you. You will use just one sucker to lift the flap and the rest of the pieces will slide under the flap. Now take the #9 with the extra pieces inserted under the flap and use this in the last bin. Now run the #10 envelopes as usual and fill the empty bins and start inserting. This saves a lot of hand work!!!
Right out of high school in the early to mid 70's I set the machines up for the girls to run. I don't think your inserter is 50 years old but then the inserters I worked on could have been 30 years old. The biggest deferences are cover over the pull out arms and the double sheet detector which is completely different. I bet if you looked at a brand new one now the only differences would be in the electronics.
I have visited job tour this week similar machines from bluecrest,Putney Bowes ,guy show me details about machines used at state farm facilities for their mailing dept.new models are belt driven ,much more faster.,can be controlled by PC files
I'm guessing mid 70's because we have similar one for 9x12's ours is clunkier and around that age. Have you ever run into an issue with the envelope and product traveling at different speeds. On ours the two are going out of time and eventually go back in sync.
Hmm. I never had that issue. Not sure how that could happen because I though chains and gears drive those. I'm curious now, I'll have to look how mine works.
@@justaprinter I think if I remember the chain drive is adjustable if ever the timing goes out, this protects the mechanics of the machine if you have a big smash.
Hi, Dan! I've subscribed to your channel for years. I was wondering whether I could inquire you about the mail-inserting business privately. Looking forward to hearing from you soon! Thank you!
@@justaprinter alot of mailing machines have folders inline ..saves alot of time . My MBO accumulator folder with read a 2 d matrix code and fold variable matching sheets ( up to 6) and enclose straight in to my cmc250 enveloper at 7 k per hour .
If you ever need help machining a part that’s broken or something that you can’t get let me know I’d be happy to help if I am able to manufacture the part :)
I’m a Bell and Howell service technician. I service and repair these machines daily. Message me if you would like me to email you any manuals for this inserter. I have service, operator, and part manuals if you need them.
I just started running some bell and howells. 2 pinnacles and 2 mail stars. We are struggling with forms that are folded inconsistently getting to feed properly. The business reply’s and other 2 forms are going through fine but can’t get it to work right because we constantly have to move the back plate with the forms varying in size. Any ideas?? Thanks
