What is it? XCVIII

563 is a fire extingusher. the "throw it at the fire" type. :-) 564 looks something like a saw set but is not. 565 I think is an ice crusher for those fancy drinks. ...lew...

According to R.H. :

O.K. I'm posting from rec.crafts.metalworking again.

563) My first guess would be a sock darning "egg". I'm not sure why the liquid -- other than to give it a bit of heft. 564) That is an interesting tool. I suspect that the sliding part under the thumb screw is serrated on the surface which fits against the body of the tool, and that the body is similarly serrated, so once you tighten the screw, the sliding part won't slide at the wrong time.

It looks as though its function is to bend something held in the angled jaws -- perhaps to do something like crimp the end of some copper tubing.

In any case, when the handles are operated, the square rod rises to push the workpiece against the horizontal part of the removable anvil in the top jaw. (I wonder what other jaw sets were available for it?)

The spring is obviously to push the rod back and thus push the handle back to its rest position.

565) I'm sure that I've seen one of these before. I forget whether it was to produce shaved ice, or to squeeze an orange half to produce juice. I think the former, because I don't see a firm enough catch on the top to keep the orange half from pushing the lid open. 566) Perhaps a weight for the end of a curtain pull? 567) Military style ammo belt. Each pocket would hold a stripper clip full of rifle rounds.

It looks as though it is intended to be only part of a complete set. Perhaps it joins to another, or perhaps to a knapsack.

568) Some kind of wood plane -- perhaps for wagon wheel spokes?

Old mystery items follow:

436) Perhaps one of Ben Franklin's electricity experiments?

471) Simple encryption/decryption device? Set the white arrow to a white number to go one way, set the darker (perhaps red) arrow to a white number to go the other way? Not a very good encryption system -- perhaps something to use along with a locksmith's book of key numbers to cut depths for recreating a key for a lock in hand?

472) I still think that this is a sort of dirt tamper -- perhaps to compact the dirt just shoveled into a post hole around the fence post.

473) No real clue on this one.

244) It looks as though it is intended to be assembled around a leather strap, and then hung from something. Perhaps part of the harness for a team of oxen?

228) Looking at this again, it seems to me that it was designed to unfold and be slid along the edge of a plank to make a scribe a particular distance from the edge. Looking at the triangular ruler in the photos, I would guess that the distance is 18", but it could be something similar.

Perhaps it is for marking planks to be cut to width at a sawmill?

76) Perhaps it goes on the bottom end of a wooden tripod leg, such as for a surveyor's tripod?

186) I don't remember seeing this one before. I would like a closer look at the jaws. Perhaps it is a punch for making holes in leather belts? I'm not sure what the pivoting part is for -- other than to keep it a fixed distance off the floor, or to clamp in a vise to free both hands to thread the leather into position and then operate the handles to punch the hole?

202) Could the "reamer" actually be a screwdriver point? I think that I've seen vaguely similar devices designed to work the screws holding pole pieces into the frame of a generator. You have to take out a very large and tight screw to replace the coils around the pole pieces.

The screw on the other end adjusts for different diameters of generators.

212) Hmmm ... can you measure the distance between the sides and the top and bottom surfaces? It looks as though it is intended to be a gauge block with a handle of some sort.

Is it tapered, or is that an artifact of the camera?

I would guess that it is quite close to 1.000" square.

246) No more to add to this one.

298) Perhaps tongs for picking up an ice cube from in a glass.

Perhaps designed to grip a coffee urn similar in shape to a Florence flask (spherical bottom and cylindrical neck).

The quality does not look good enough to be chemistry lab equipment.

447) No additional guesses on this one.

432) Hmm ... designed to hold bait on a trap?

Or designed to mold a lead weight of a fixed size?

383) I forget what guesses this one brought.

I think that it is either designed for chipping something with the edge presented by the hammer head used in a normal manner, or for folding the edge of something at an awkward angle, thus explaining the angle of the hammer face.

I prefer this collection of old puzzles to your posting the previous week's as a semi-continuation of the current week's puzzles.

Now to see what others have guessed.

Enjoy, DoN.

Too simple to be an "enigma", which used several rotors, with crossed wiring from contacts on one side to contacts on the other side, and some subset of them were rotated with each new character entered. There was a keyboard, which closed contacts, fed through all of the rotors (I think that the general one was three rotor, and the submarine force later got a four-rotor version), and the scrambled wiring eventually lit a small lamp behind the character which stood for the original one.

But it probably could be used for something like changing digits in a key code book for cutting a key from the number on the lock. (They would not want it to be too simple, but also not so difficult that a locksmith could not make keys at need.

Enjoy, DoN.

565 appears to be some sort of a kitchen grinder-- for coffee or spices would be my guess 566 is the handle from a walking stick

567 military ammo pouches?

The machineman entity posted thusly:

566: Candle holder?

#564 is a Stearns saw set, possibly 103 or 104 model.

Tom

I think it's more likely from a simple machine (not a "coder/decoder" like an Enigma machine) that has to scatter sequential digits such that the are not adjacent in the machine's operation. Don's suggestion of a key-cutter might be close, but it would do the mapping because you don't really want a key cut to pattern #4 to be close to a key cut to #3 or #5 (replace "key" with whatever this thing does! I think security/encryption is a bit of a red herring, it's probably something more to do with mechanical tolerances and not cutting a strip of something too thin or maybe something more like the utility of a hash index in computing.)

I can't rule out it being from some sort of encryption device but the mapping is so straightforward that it would provide zero real security itself.

And the fact that there are twenty teeth on the cog and twenty digits (two different colors) around the dial has to mean something, I just don't know what! Going back to the "hash index" idea, maybe there are ten useful doohinkeys in a machine, and they don't want to wear any out in favor of others, so at each shift change they advance the dial one and use that setting on the machine.

As to style, it's simplicity and lack of adornment suggests something like a East European public telephone from the 50's. At the same time, it looks like it was machined out of solid billet (aluminum? and really thick housing!) and not cast as a mass-produced item would be.

As enigmatic as Gary Larson's "Cow Tools" :-).

Tim.

I think that it's supposed to be a dragon, though the head of it is lacking in detail and is the weakest part of the piece.

Rob

Sounds reasonable, though this tool doesn't look like it would be very comfortable to hold with a bare hand.

Yes, please post them, I just did a google search on bucksaws and didn't see anything like #447, so I'd be interested to see your photos.

Thanks, Rob

Would you believe "Carbon tetra-chloride"?

It _does_ extinguish fires. But the gas it givesoff is rather dangerous.

[ ... ]

Note that when one of the digits on the dial is aligned with the leftmost index mark (clearly white), the red digits are visible through the holes. When one of the digits on the dial is aligned with the rightmost index mark (darker -- perhaps red), the white digits are visible instead.

The white digits are sequential, but in reverse order of the ones on the dial, while the red digits are scattered.

Using the white index, you have ten possible substitution patterns, depending on which dial digit is aligned with the index. Using the darker (possibly red) index, you have ten other possible substitution patterns.

Perhaps it is for something simple like obfuscating codes being broadcast -- say from a controller to police cars via radio.

The roller is not part of a switch, but rather just a detent, to hold the "dial" at its last setting.

The angled base suggests that it should be on a desktop or a console top. It is too dark to tell whether it has some drilled and tapped holes for mounting to the surface, or perhaps has a black felt pad to simply make it sort of non-slip.

Agreed -- but someone cared enough to do a nice job of engraving the digits and anodize the various parts rather nicely.

Enjoy, DoN.

566 Glove of the type required when petting my cat.

The Robert Bonomi entity posted thusly:

Minor trivia: Folks who made hats used to use 'carbon-tet', and it affected their brains. Hence the phrase "Mad as a hatter".

Robert Bonomi:

Oleg Lego:

Nope. That was mercury, not carbon tet.

563 Fire extinguisher bottle filled with Carbontetrachloride IIRC

564 Saw Set

565 Wall mounted ice crusher

566 Cane topper?

567 Ammo Belt

568 Ice shaver for making shaved ice like snowcones.

snipped-for-privacy@vex.net (Mark Brader) wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@corp.supernews.com:

Correct. CCl4 gives you liver cancer IIRC.

Thought it was mercury salts that did that to the hatters. The mercury salts were used for curing the pelts that went into the hats.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ If you're gonna be dumb, you better be tough +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Heard the same story, but with mercury.

Actually it was the mercury that they used in hatmaking that affected them.