What is it? CXCVII

1085 Superegg (ellipsoid with higher power than 2) Stands on end. From 1960's, described in Scientific American Magazine.

3/4 of the way down.

1087 looks like a street sign post cap , and 1090 is a pair of gunstock checkering cutters .

1088: Fire starter - a pot filled 2/3 with kerosene or fuel oil. The ceramic ball on the end of the rod soaks up the fuel and is placed under the fire logs and lit, the fuel oil burns long enough to start the logs and you don't need kindling. We used 'em to light our fireplace logs for years until we got heat in our house (house was built in 1890)... Joel in Florida

today only two silly guesses ;-(

1085 hmm, isn´t this a virtual picture, completely rendered on computer? you can find similar ones on my spoiler ... 1089 looks similar to some "cable distance keeper" , or "cable organizer" of modern times.

greetings from germany chris

Dang, beat me to the only one I knew-

Dave

The "supercircle" (a 2-dimensional projection of the same curve) was the basis of the custom-designed font used by the ill-fated e-commerce fashion site boo.com The founders were of course Swedish, and had grown up surrounded by Piet Hein design work. It was just one of their attempts (well-intentioned, although finally doomed) to bring the aesthetic of Scandinavian design to the flat canvas of the Web.

I use it myself as the outline for sword tsuba in cast bronze.

1. Black and white photo of golden egg laid by Piet Hein's goose.
2. Eyeball adjuster. Used to increase intraocular distance of people with closely-spaced eyes. Lets people use cheap non-adjustable binoculars.
3. Used to fasten a razorblade onto the end of a hobby horse stick. You sharpen the blade by riding the hobby horse over a cement sidewalk.
4. Chamber pot with clog remover. Solved the problem of backed-up chamber pots.
5. Early brass knuckles. You made the victim wear it. Works best when heated.
6. I have one of these. They are everlasting toothbrushes. The bristles last longer than your teeth.
7. Inside of a ping-pong ball. Been there.

--Dogstar

1085--Escher is alive and well, and doing photography.

1086--Looks like something I have, which I am guessing holds a pair of carbons for an arc light--for example, inside an old movie projector.

1090--I was going to say "riffler." Gunstock grooving tool seems like a better answer--would that be a subset?

1085 appears to be a three-dimentional representation of the shape popularized by Piet Hein, the super-ellipse .

It has been sold for a while as a decorative doowhatchie called a super-egg. This is a super-egg, in what appears to be stainless steel.

1086 looks like the blank-holding jig for a double-copy key-cutting machine.

1090 are two leather-tooling tools.

1089 is a "Universal Tool", Patent number 241,893 from May 24, 1881. See:

For handling stove-lids, pots, dishes and kitchen utensils... also as a support for flat irons, coffee pots and can be used as a meat-tenderer.

Number 1090 looks like a tool for removing broken cashew nuts from an alarm clock. Joe G

"R.H." wrote in news:46e8ebb9$0$17127 $ snipped-for-privacy@roadrunner.com:

1090 is a pair of checkering files (or checkering tools), used in checkering gun stocks and grips. The top tool in the lower picture is a single-line checker file, the lower tool is a "skip-line" or bordering tool.

According to R.H. :

Posting from rec.crafts.metalworking, as usual.

1085) I would swear that someone made a steel bearing "darning egg" -- way too heavy to be practical, but it should last forever. :-) 1086) I would like a closer look at the bracket to the right of the moving parts. It looks as though it has electrical binding posts going through it.

If that is what is there, and if the white material is a porcelain or ceramic, I suspect that this holds a sample in tension to be broken by some manner or other. One possibility would be that this is one of two such holders for the start and stop sensors for a chronograph (for measuring bullet speeds).

1087) part of a folding coatrack, perhaps? This fits inside the tubular sections which support the coathangers? 1088) for boiling and cleaning socks or other clothing? 1089) Looks like something to rest a hot pot on. 1090) For filing rounded bottom grooves in wood or soft metals?

The part with the teeth is replacable.

Now to see what others have suggested.

Enjoy, DoN.

#1090 Gunstock checkering tools

The others, not a clue -- these are getting harder every week.

Most of them have been answered correctly this week, though I'm still not sure about number 1086.

Rob

It looks to me like a device for holding two carbon rods, for creating an arc...for some purpose I couldn't fathom.

The only other clue for this device is that the former owner was an electrical engineer, with music and optics as interests. So it could be for holding carbon rods, as you and Leo suggest.

Rob

I've got a number of things that haven't made it onto the site for some reason or another, and I'm going to post a few of them in this thread. These first two were submitted by visitors, I don't know what they are.

1. formatting link

The owner's description:

It appears to be hand-made.

The holes on opposing sides line up when the object is folded flat and when the object is opened into a square, .

The top part appears to have no function other than holding the piece flat when it is folded, and the fit when it is folded down is not snug.

Along the inside of the bottom of the object, there is a recessed section running across all four sides, from the bottom edge to just above the row of holes; this creates a ledge or lip just above the holes.

For scale, the object is 8" long when folded flat. When opened square, the outside edge is roughly 4-1/2", and the inside edge is 4". The lip is recessed 1/4".

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1. This device was found in New York:

Any ideas on these?

Rob

1085: Not quite. A super-ellipse is two-dimensional. The three-dimensional form is specifically called a super-egg.