A Fox No.5 found, or, Hey, Jude
Good news! I finally found a Fox upstrike!
Bad news. It’s being sold by a keychopper, and he’s already pulled off its keys.
Good news! The keychopper will throw in the whole typewriter for the cost of the keys!
Bad news. The typewriter is a disaster.
Worse news. There’s a wasps’ nest inside it.
Could-be-worse news. The wasps are all dead.
Who was the patron saint of hopeless causes again?
I’m happy/sad/puzzled/amazed/baffled for you.
Comment by mpclemens — December 4, 2009 @ 1:50 pm
Oh gosh…hurts just looking at that! Carnage!
Comment by littleflowerpetals — December 5, 2009 @ 11:54 am
Were you able to resist yelling at the keychopper? That thing is painful to look at. Like an old man with his dentures out.
Comment by Strikethru — December 5, 2009 @ 1:19 pm
No, I didn’t yell at the ‘chopper. I wanted him to want to sell me the typer! He turned out to be a nice guy, and honestly, if this were a more common machine it probably wouldn’t be worth saving.
Little by little it’s coming along. I couldn’t figure out what was preventing the platen from turning until I discovered that the feed rollers weren’t just flat–they’d fused to the platen rubber! I literally had to surgically separate them.
One thing is clear even in its state of neglect: these were very well-built machines. The Remington upstrikes are positively flimsy compared to the Fox! Where Remington uses wood in its keylevers and tension bar, Fox uses aluminum and cast iron. Even the tension springs themselves are more substantial, and individually screwed to the tension bar. Remington’s tension springs are half the thickness and rely on their own tension to hold them in position; if one of the two screws holding the tension bar in place becomes loose, the springs can easily work out of alignment with the keylevers.
After conservation, she’s going to stick around just long enough for me to photographically document. I already have a new home lined up for her.
Comment by olivander — December 6, 2009 @ 10:53 pm