I need some help in trying to think through how this might happen. I think part of my problem is that I really don't know what a waffle iron pattern would look like. My assumption is that each paddle is like a skillet with one half of the pattern being the outside and the other half the inside. The mold would then split along the outer edge. I also don't really know the process that was followed to make the mold. Would some sand be put in, tamped flat, then the pattern set in and the rest of the sand put in and tamped for both the top and bottom? (that's my impression anyway).
If you look at the picture, every letter and logo line is offset the same amount - a perfect shift.
In my mind that had to have happened during the construction of the mold. I just can't see how a shift during the pour could have such a perfect, consistent result. I can understand a core shift in a hollow casting like an engine block but I don't see a core being needed to make waffle irons.
Here's the only way I can dream up to make an iron look like this. The mold was being prepared. Some sand put in and tamped. Then the top pattern was just set in, no extra sand or pressure applied. For some reason the pattern was then removed and put back in right away, without smoothing out the sand, in a slightly different position. The result would be the offset of all the lettering and logo leaving the light impression we see now.
That's about the only way my mind can make it work. I would appreciate any help in seeing another possibility.
This is a neat piece, but as others have said, just an oddity, not a big value enhancer. I would have thought it would have been culled and remelted in a quality control inspection.
Tom
