Mechanical

[OfTheDamned]

We talk about how advanced things are in this new digital age, but many of us forget about how amazing things are from a mechanical standpoint.

These are amazing works of mechanical art.

The Only Pair of Matching Singing Bird Pistols, Attributed to Fr

 

[Frisco]

Very beautiful.

I can see twospirits wearing one on each hip now.

 

[EarlyMon]

Fantastic!

How about a calculator?

The Astounding Curta Mechanical Calculator - YouTube

 

[Bob Maxey]

Fantastic!

How about a calculator?

The Astounding Curta Mechanical Calculator - YouTube

Actually, they are amazing. I own a Curta.

Take a look at a "run of the mill" Marchant calculator. Countless levers, cogs, wheels, springs and fiddle faddles all working to compute 34 times 123. If you want one repaired, I am your guy. I cut my teeth on Marchants.

 

[EarlyMon]

Cool! I was wondering who else has played with a Curta but hats off for owning one.

Looking up some of the Soviet wonders...

 

[Frisco]

If you want one repaired, I am your guy. I cut my teeth on Marchants.

Are parts being manufactured for those? Or is it a scavenger hunt every time you want to fix one?

 

[TxGoat]

Here's my submission for mechanical work of art...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W4iZ382VqA

 

[Bob Maxey]

Cool! I was wondering who else has played with a Curta but hats off for owning one.

Looking up some of the Soviet wonders...

My father worked for Marchant Calculators and he collected lots of interesting stuff. Somewhere I have a few 1K (perhaps 2, 3, or 4 4K) Toshiba Core Memory Boards. Very cool looking and as I recall, costly at the time.

The little ferrite donuts interconnected with wire.

We sometime forget just what can be done with mechanical systems.

 

[EarlyMon]

Loved my DigiComp, got it when they came out.

Digi-Comp I - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An uncompromising, unbridled ALU with a massive 3 bit resolution!

Picture -

Spoiler

Yes, the slide lever said CLOCK. No, mine went over a decade without gathering the dust shown in that picture.

 

[El Presidente]

Fantastic!

How about a calculator?

The Astounding Curta Mechanical Calculator - YouTube

That's got to be one of the cleverest things I've ever seen!

 

[EarlyMon]

How about the VU Lighter? Small amount of cotton in the colored plastic area, turn upside down and press silver button on side to recharge from clear reservoir. Zippo style action. The cool ones had floating trinkets rather than ad panels.

Scripto Vu-lighters - a set on Flickr

Gotta include trains as mechanical marvels. Does this qualify?

World's Smallest Working Model Train Layout - YouTube

 

[SUroot]

A snapshot for a passion of mine then...

 

[OfTheDamned]

I am a huge watch buff. Mechanical is the only way to go, IMHO.

 

[SUroot]

I am a huge watch buff. Mechanical is the only way to go, IMHO.

I agree, although I have an immensely sleek Swiss Quartz which is beautiful in every single way, I am gutted it is not mechanical

My fianc

 

[Frisco]

The photography alone is worth the price of admission.

 

[OfTheDamned]

I agree, although I have an immensely sleek Swiss Quartz which is beautiful in every single way, I am gutted it is not mechanical

My fiancé bought me some cuff links made from watch movements, they're really cool. Totally steampunk

I have a couple of automatics of the same model that if combined would make one excellent watch but I just cannot find anyone to do it.

I became a huge fan of manual movements when I first learned about Panerai. While I have a few automatics, nothing beats the feel of winding up a watch yourself.

 

[SUroot]

I just like mechanical. The craftmanship and skill that goes into an automatic mechanical movement is far more impressive to me than a manual wind. Using gravity to keep time the movement wound amazing.

That said, using a vibrating frequency by passing electricity through quartz is similarly amazing.


I do have a nice 1969 manual wind Omega deville which is stunningly elegant and I love it, but automatic mechanical watches certainly impress me more from an engineering perspective

 

[Bob Maxey]

Have a little look see here: Holtzapffel.org - A catalog and history of Holtzapffel lathes - Home

The Holtzapffel Lathes are extraordinary for the time and they still are. Some incredibly complex ornamental turnings can be created with such a lathe.

This was "turned" on such a lathe: OTI :: Holtz Pineapple

Here is another watch:

The World

 

[Bob Maxey]

My fianc

 

[Bob Maxey]

Are parts being manufactured for those? Or is it a scavenger hunt every time you want to fix one?

My pack rat father brought home a garage full of parts. Thousands of tiny boxes filled with screws and springs, reels, motors, covers, internal levers and cams and cogs and frames and every part in between. They sat in my grandmothers garage for several decades until we tossed them. This was pre-Internet.

Apparently, the parts are scarce and there is a collector market for them.

The parts are truly odd as are the tools. Some internal parts look like tools. If you ever get a chance to look inside, do it. You will appreciate just how hard they were to fix as well as the engineering required to get hundreds of parts to move together in order to compute to 20 decimal places.

Also, if you did not keep your fingers out of the moving parts, you could no longer play the banjo. No BS, the machine could cut off a finger. Huge amounts of torque.

We had one of these: SCM Marchant Cogito 240SR Calculator

I only remember this general kind of Marchant: File:Figurematic-10SDX.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Note how many decimal places it will calculate.

I recall being told by a programmer at work how the old guys probably can't learn how to program and all they know are calculators like the one above; as though we cant learn to program because we are not geared for this modern world. I can well imagine that programmer not at all being able to sit down and design a machine like a Figurematic. I'll learn programming long before he learns to make a Matrchant.

 

[SUroot]

Here is another watch:

The World

 

[Frisco]

I can well imagine that programmer not at all being able to sit down and design a machine like a Figurematic. I'll learn programming long before he learns to make a Matrchant.

Indeed.

That put me in mind of my dad coming to me when I was 13 with his railroad watch. He wanted to teach me how to take it apart and then put it back together in working order, he said. He had the tools and a special bench in a curtained area of the garage loft where he liked to repair friends and co-workers watches and clocks.

I remember it well; it was a Waltham-Ball. We walked up to the loft and he was jabbering about the procedure. I was scared to death I'd mess it up, but he told me that was "impossible unless you lose something."

Well, he did everything from step one of dismantling it to reassembling it. And I was ok with it because he wanted to teach me what he knew, not how to actually do it.

 

[Gandalf7]

Thanks to all for the contributions. I really enjoyed scanning this thread! The watch discussion reminded me of my grandfather's pocket watch, given to me some years ago after he passed. Pulling it out now, I see that is an Elgin, nothing elaborate but significant to me for sentimental reasons.

In looking up Elgin watches, I ran across a web page that watch buffs might enjoy--it reproduces an article from the July 1869 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine. The author was able to visit the Elgin plant and describes how those watches were manufactured. For example, as to the screws, the author writes, "Here are machines which will cut screws with five hundred threads to the inch; the finest used in the watch have two hundred and fifty. Even these threads are invisible to the naked eye, and it takes one hundred and forty-four thousand of the screws to weigh a pound." Amazing!

 

[SUroot]

Thanks to all for the contributions. I really enjoyed scanning this thread! The watch discussion reminded me of my grandfather's pocket watch, given to me some years ago after he passed. Pulling it out now, I see that is an Elgin, nothing elaborate but significant to me for sentimental reasons.

In looking up Elgin watches, I ran across a web page that watch buffs might enjoy--it reproduces an article from the July 1869 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine. The author was able to visit the Elgin plant and describes how those watches were manufactured. For example, as to the screws, the author writes, "Here are machines which will cut screws with five hundred threads to the inch; the finest used in the watch have two hundred and fifty. Even these threads are invisible to the naked eye, and it takes one hundred and forty-four thousand of the screws to weigh a pound." Amazing!

Yes amazing indeed. Watch making then is the equivalent of the nano-tech of today. Let's call it nano-mech

 

[OfTheDamned]

Thanks to all for the contributions. I really enjoyed scanning this thread! The watch discussion reminded me of my grandfather's pocket watch, given to me some years ago after he passed. Pulling it out now, I see that is an Elgin, nothing elaborate but significant to me for sentimental reasons.

In looking up Elgin watches, I ran across a web page that watch buffs might enjoy--it reproduces an article from the July 1869 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine. The author was able to visit the Elgin plant and describes how those watches were manufactured. For example, as to the screws, the author writes, "Here are machines which will cut screws with five hundred threads to the inch; the finest used in the watch have two hundred and fifty. Even these threads are invisible to the naked eye, and it takes one hundred and forty-four thousand of the screws to weigh a pound." Amazing!

Yes amazing indeed. Watch making then is the equivalent of the nano-tech of today. Let's call it nano-mech

Watch making is a true art form. Think of all the RnD that goes into building something like this and how much harder it was before computers, machine shops and 3D graphic models could be created. The precision, the labor and the time (no pun intended) it would take to create one of these beautiful pieces of precision art just 40 years ago is mind boggling. Even with this new technology it shows to be a real process to put out a single watch.

Breguet - Making of @ Marie Antoinette Grande Complication Pocket Watch - YouTube

Spoiler

Audemars Piguet Grande Complication - YouTube

Spoiler

Blancpain - Brassus Caliber 0233 Carrousel Minute Repeater - YouTube

Spoiler

Caliber 2755 - Vacheron Constantin - YouTube

Spoiler

Tour de l'Ile - 250th anniversary - Vacheron Constantin - YouTube

Spoiler

Assembling ETA 2801 watch movement - YouTube

Spoiler

Officine Panerai - P. 9001 - YouTube

Spoiler

A . Lange & S