HMV S.B. No.4 N.G.

When the opportunity came along to get a boxed spare soundbox for the HMV 101, jumped at it and got this 'new' boxed No. 4 soundbox.

The box has been opened of course, the soundbox also likely has been used and judging from marks on the screws has been serviced. This servicing may of course have been some decades ago though.

The now salmon coloured wrapper originally was a more bright orange, judging from the bit left on the bottom of the box.

The soundbox is held in place by the thick card supports.

This is the first version of the number 4 soundbox with the short rubber at the back, lettering in front behind the mica and is all brass. The later iterations of the number 4 had the back made from Zamac. The Zamac wears very badly over time, that makes repairing these pot-metal soundboxes very risky. Even though they really need new gaskets, they can just crumble when taking them apart. The chance to have a boxed spare seemed a good plan before tackling the hard gaskets of the HMV 101's later pot-metal backed soundbox.

A 'new' spare HMV soundbox number 4 in its original packaging from '25 / '26.

Not sure what the N.G. in the type designation on the label is for. Could that be 'New Generation'?

Remington Portable with new platen rubber

After making the keyboard look nicer, the next item was an attempt to make the quality of typing better. The machine was already quite usable, yet the platen was rock hard (noisy!) and was actually bent. When turning a full rotation, the centre section would move about 1 or 2 mm. This is not good for the imprint of the type and also can make the linefeed go off at an angle, when one set of feedrollers wins out over the other on the platen.

This time the weeks of letting oil seep in the platen knob screw payed off. After also applying some white petrol (basically making creeping oil), thankfully the platen knob screw came off without needing much force. This has a large screwhead, but actually is a very small screw with delicate thread. (Probably just as well that I didn't try to force it in any way on this or the other RP2 machine.)

With the screw removed, the platen knob can be coaxed off the rod. Then the platen rod can be pulled out to the left. This leaves the platen loose in the paper well between its brackets and can be manouevred out, taking care to not to bend the line guide. Lifting up at the right side, the linespacing ratchet is shifted from under the spring loaded roller and all comes out.

The platen lifted out of the machine, the paper well is now accessible to remove the rust. The platen knob has two small notches that fit two indents in the platen-rod end to fix it against rotating.

The platen-rod keyway fits the notch in the hole of the platen flange. The stud at the end of the keyway prevents the platen-rod being pulled out to the right side, this is the stop that the rod is pulled against when unlocking the carriage.

Now with the platen out, the linefeed pawl assembly is loose on its flange, can be good to store it somewhere safe or to fix it in place with some rubber bands.

Having the platen out it turned out that the platen itself was not bent, but the rubber of the platen had dried out so much to come unstuck from the core and deform. Luckily the rubber of the platen came off easily like a sleeve from the core. On this machine, the platen core is made of wood (not brass) with metal flanges at the ends. (Forgot to take a picture of the core...)

Before replacing the rubber, made an attempt at rejuvenating the old rubber sleeve to see if it could be made more flexible again. That actually worked very well and also made the rubber sleeve unusable. With some thought about drying out of rubber, seemed to make sense that some light fractions of simple hydrocarbon could enter the material again. Wrapped in a rag with white petrol and sealed in aluminium foil, the rubber was left to 'soak'. Left too long actually. After a day soaking, the rubber is again rubbery (feels more like Shore 90 than slate stone).

Fitting it back onto the platen and in the machine it has not only become flexible again but also grown by 1 or 2 % in size. Should have realized...

Typing on it was very quiet in the middle of a line, louder at the ends. The platen being larger, floated free over the core and could be flexed and moved by hand. End result is experience and knowing more about old rubber, but not a usable platen.

So then to the recovering with new rubber. Instead of sending off to a professional platen recovery service, used rubber sleeves stacked onto the core. Bicycle innertubes are a good source of about the right sizes, but too soft and too grippy for the outer layer.

The new platen was then built from three layers of innertube with the outer layer from heatshrink tubing. The thin heatshrink tubing also allows for getting closer to the target platen diameter (about 28 mm).

This way the platen feels about right in stiffness and in surface. The idea behind this way of stacking the materials was to have the heatshrink layer as the outer, harder and smooth layer to take the type and have a softer rubber tickness underneath to dampen the strike of the type.

The end-result is not as quiet as the 'floating rubber' was or the way a Noiseless is, but definitely it has removed the sharp clack of the machine. The linefeed also no longer veers off course and the quality of the type print is much improved. A clearer, crisper imprint, with less striking force needed for a good, complete character.

All in all this Remington Portable typewriter is a fun machine to tinker with!

Former typewriter factory (not so old)

Two weeks ago when visiting a company in the B-Amsterdam building, was told this was actually a former IBM typewriter plant. Hadn't known that. From some quick online research; the complex housed the international factory and offices for IBM typewriters.

On the Google Maps streetview image; the office block is on the left and the lower factory building on the right.

Rather uninspiring (to me, at least) 1968 office architecture.

The lower factory building today houses a distribution centre for a parcel service. After being left empty for 15 years the office block is being used as a place for startup companies.

The inside today looks very unlike a 1968 office, some images on the web site for www.b-amsterdam.nl (warning: obnoxious autoplay audio and video).

Remington Portable with new keytops

Probably sometime during the fifties, the keyboard of this little Remington Portable #2 typewriter was altered. Some of the regular assortment of fractions of the British keyboard were replaced by greek and math symbols. This was likely done for a student starting on statistics needing to write reports - taking a then already old (cheap) machine and have that modified.

The new, assembled typeslugs look convincing, the keyboard a bit less so. The way the keys are all a bit askew and out of alignment suggest they were mangled a bit, perhaps the old rings were pulled off without the right tool - who knows.

Most keytops were replaced with late forties/early fifties Imperial labels (as spotted by Nick of x over it), the greek symbols from engraved disks. No idea why all were changed. Perhaps the whole set of keys was changed to match the '+, =' keytop that could be had in the Imperial set. Strangely the '%, ½' label is from yet another range, could be original or just one label that was floating around the workshop at the time. Some of the Imperial labels start to come out from under the rings on the side, somehow not a good fit for the keys and rings.

Net result of it all is that the chrome (not nickel) rings and the assortment of labels give it a bit of a jumbled look. And when new, some machines even had white keytops that made them look rather smart! 

Unfortunately most machines today do not look quite as bright as they do in these user manual pictures. The paper has yellowed and certainly the celluloid has tanned. Many originally white keyboards now have keys with varying shades of ivory through tan to sometimes even deep ochre.

Benefit of these later replacement keytops was that the new chrome rings were held on with three small tabs. Some keys were already loose; these rings looked easy to remove with standard tools. That made it relatively easy to consider replacing all keytops with new labels. These Portable #2's are plentiful and this one had been messed with already, so did not feel bad about tinkering some more.

Having decided to change keytops, it becomes possible to consider what typeface and colours to use! Could do something really fancy, like red keytops to match the Remington label. Or a very fancy twenties typeface...

With a drawing program, quickly some colours and typefaces were tested. For colour, very quickly found that plain black on white worked best for me (or at least; liked best by me).

Experimenting with a serif typeface made me think of Corona, rather than a Remington. Usually the special keys and top row have a contrasting serif typeface to the sans-serif main keys - experimented a bit with that, but one typeface made for the cleanest look. Keyboards of the time use a sans-serif that looks a bit like Johnston, so experimented a bit with that (top left). For the special keys it does have some drawbacks, so in the end came back to a clean, thin Gill Sans typeface for all keys (bottom right).

Even though Gill Sans really took of in the thirties, it was actually designed and published  in the late twenties so not too out of place on this typewriter with its modified keyboard. With the chosen design, one sheet was (laser-) printed on thick white (ivory) paper and one set of disks on a sheet of transparency.

Taking off the keytops was surprisingly difficult. The tabs bend out of the way
easily enough and did not even break as I feared. The rings had however rusted with the key cups, making some of them very hard to remove without doing major damage. In the end they all came off without any major mishaps. Decided then not to replace the whole keytop insert, but place the new label and sheet on top of the current laminated card labels. (One small dab of glue on the side of the label holds the orientation. Should come off again without damage to the visible part of the older label.)

The keyboard does look very shiny and new now. Makes the contrast between the chrome rings and the nickel of the rest of the machine also less jarring (to me...).

(Now with the keyboard all clean and new, the rust spots on the paintwork start to look a bit out of place. Hmm...  :-)

Polishing power

Not sure now if they were ever lacquered. One strange thing also noticeable, two steel and two brass rivets used to fix the clasp to the base of the case. Must have been a reason for that...

In reality not quite as blindingly bright as in the picture, but clean and bright. It does make a case a little more acceptable to have in the house though :-)

Objective completeness and correctness

The Bausch & Lomb microscope had two replaced objectives when I got it. Given the age of the instrument and that it had been used at least into the seventies, that was not so strange. The high power objective had been replaced by an Olympus 100x and the low power 4x also by an Olympus (black, red ring).

The 4x was still perfectly good, the 100x unfortunately had dirty lenses. Probably old immersion oil plus some growth (?), not sure if or how this could be cleaned. Regardless of quality, it just didn't look right. Similar to a twenties typewriter with plastic spools - perfectly functional but not 'right'.

Fortunately in the online era, it becomes possible to scout and buy parts globally. These objectives of the 'double knurl' type are not all that common and just don't happen at all in Europe. So at (surprisingly considerable shipping) expense, found and got shipped across the Atlantic replacement objectives of the correct type.

This looks much better (to me at least ;-)

Very lucky that also the new 97x high power objective seems to be in excellent order. Clean and gives good image. From the serial number MK7316 this particular objective was manufactured in 1943. Probably won't be using the oil-immersion objective all that much, but good to have the complete, functional set.

Something odd on the title page

A while ago I picked up a book at a local church fund raiser, in nice condition and a good read as well. The title page was puzzling at first.

It clearly states that the author is Paul de Kruif (a very Dutch name), with Dutch translation by Dr C. Easton (an English name).

What I didn't know, was that Paul de Kruif was at that time a rather well know American micro-biologist who wrote "Microbe Hunters" in '26. So it was indeed written in English and translated into Dutch (by Dr. C. Easton).

Fifth printing in '39 of the Dutch translation, hardcover book with dust jacket. Still very readable stories about the discoverers and discoveries of the small world of microbes. About how human understanding and successes in battling disease were achieved - relatively recently.