What is it? CLII

872. Google says they made toy trains so I guess a lap counter of some kind. The spindle with the worm gear would have to be connected to something and each rotation would advance the dial one digit. 873. The metal reinforced front edge indicates it's designed to plough into something. For clearing snow off your drive perhaps. 875. Another variant on the self clamping log grapple. 876. Google says they made typewriters but other than that I have no idea.

-- Dave Baker Puma Race Engines

Camp USA engineer minces about for high performance specialist (4,4,7)

872: Let me try a reasoned guess... It is a pendulum turns counter intended to accumulate rotations about an horizontal axis.

It only counts modulo 10,000 so it probably isn't used as an odometer or for counting revolutions of any fast-moving machine.

In use, in the case, the reading is not visible. This suggests that it isn't used for control or measurement. That leaves some sort of audit function.

It seems to be well-made, suggesting that many were made, but not a very large number of them.

The case is unsuitable for exposure to the elements, so it is used in an indoor, benign environment. This lets out it being used as a turns counter for a Ferris Wheel.

I therefore guess that it is used as a audit counter for turnstiles (diagonal axis, not vertical axis) used to verify the number of people entering (some sort of theater or exhibit). The agent of the person expecting a royalty could lock the case into a recess in the turnstile, and come back later to retrieve an independent count of turns.

876 a plane tool for wood crafting?

i am sorry, only one silly guess this week

greetings from germany chris

872 tachometer

*nods* I've actually used something that looks almost identical to that tool for the purpose of clearing snow.

It's either that, or Godzilla's pooper-scooper.

--julie

875: It is a grapple. There is one just like it on Ebay. Auction #200065751038

877: It looks like the wedge thing that holds a blade on a plane.

If shafts are available, normally you'd use something like a veeder-root counter for this sort of thing. There are variants that are not resettable and variants that count only in the positive direction.

OTOH This Lionel device can count both forwards and backwards. So wherever it's put, you don't expect much back-and-forth action but all-in-the-same-direction action.

It seems from the pictures that it's padded in a little box in use. There is no obvious attachment points on the little box, which is most curious.

I was thinking more along the lines of something you put in a package to figure out how many times it flipped over when it fell off the back of the UPS truck, the early 20th-century equivalent of a ShockWatch.

Tim.

Julie Waters schrieb:

Sure, they are very common e.g. in Norway. A few more modern editions can be seen here:

Tor

Lionel made instruments for the Navy in WWI and WWII. A Navy engineer might want to know how many revolutions a big, slow-moving engine had made during a certain period. I think the padded box was designed to be slipped into place on the end of a slowly moving crankshaft.

According to R.H. :

O.K. Posting from Rec.crafts.metalworking again. I hope that my news server doesn't drop this before I am through replying.

An interesting collection of images:

872) Hmm "Lionel" used to make children's electric train sets (among other things). However, this is something else entirely.

Looking at it, and assuming that the worm gear is fixed in place, it is designed to count the number of times the hanging part with the dial has passed through 360 degrees (a full turn) within the frame.

Adding the case, it *could* count the number of times that round case has rolled a complete turn. Knowing the OD of the case, one could calculate the length of the rolling paths -- but the straps could introduce errors, unless that case goes in yet another round object. I get about 14" per roll with just the length setting the diameter. Looking at the case, I would have to guess about 18" per roll, or two rolls per yard. Since it can count to 99 -- or perhaps 999 or 9999, depending on how the lower scale behaves, we have at least about 150 feet before it repeats.

873) For removing light snow from a sidewalk or path.

874) Perhaps for blocking a hat? More to expand within something than to clamp something like a vise would do.

It looks as though the leadscrew is of opposite hand threads on either side of center, so if it is a single leadscrew connected to the two knobs, then it would expand or contract equally around a center point.

875) For lifting a block of ice -- or a carcass in a butcher's shop?

876) Other than that it changes the distance between the sole plate and the steel rod at the top as it is adjusted, and that it has a roller (or perhaps a pair of them) at the right hand end, I really don't have a clue.

877) The rubber band is not original -- but it might have had a spring around there to keep the jaws closed as the rubber band does now. Or maybe it was to be wound about with rawhide to clamp more firmly as the rawhide dried?

At a guess, the user sat on the board and used a file, handsaw or other hand tool on whatever was held in the jaws.

Now to see what others have guessed -- if the news articles are still present.

Enjoy, DoN.

That is part of a ship's log. A small brass "torpedo" atttaches to it and as the log turns in the water it spins this counter and thats how you measure distance on the open ocean. I had one of these until my house burned and it melted

I thought Royal was in business before typewriters came along like Remington was, but now I'm not so sure. From my typewriter repair days, I remember seeing old Royal models where the keys were underneath the paper and struck the platen on the bottom. You had to grab the platen and lift it all the way up on its hinge so you could see what you just typed. Those models were VERY early and the typewriter came along around 1870, so the date looks right.

angle, I'm guessing it's a tool for aligning typewriter keys for a model of typewriter that even a museum probably can't find anymore.

Most of them have been answered correctly this week, please see the answer page for more info:

Rob

872: Lionel dip-needle compass 873: Manure shovel 874: From the complexity and materials, I'd guess something from a ship. Maybe part of a periscope? 875: Picks up something; bundled straw or rolls of paper or something else rounded 876: A failed attempt at a parallel cutter; until the device was manufactured, no one realized the blades were in the plane of the tool and hence wouldn't work.

877: 'tis merely a fancy nutcracker.