More Words From a 104 Year Old Typewriter

I still can't type very good on this typewriter.  Then it is a new method which must be learned, and I am not taking time to properly learn it. 

Typing outside after finishing touch-up painting.

I've not been that much of a Halloween person since probably my teens.  I decided to beat the soon to be cold Michigan weather and finish touching up paint on the outside of the house so I hopefully do not have more to do when Spring of 2027 arrives.

I had enough time for a quick typecast. 

We've been having an unusually warm October with day time temperatures in the upper 70°sF and 50° F or warmer mornings after an overly wet September.  

Autumn leaves are mostly gone so I may not get to do any very colorful images with the next CotM. 

I hope to finally make a mistake free typecast in November.
 

Typewriters are Getting Older: A 104 Year Old Typewriter and CotM

 

 

After the car wash I have a short drive on a city street before I get to this first road on my way home.

This is the second turn onto the road to my house at the end of the video.

 

104 year old Corona 3

My videos are not edited and are as bad as my typing.

Using this typewriter reminds me of driving trucks that needed double clutched and triple clutched.  I'm sure I can still do that as well as drift shifting, but I cannot get the hang of pressing CAP and FIG while one finger typing with my right hand.

 I've tried touch typing on my Corona 3 typewriters.  Not very successful.

 I have not done any Durometer readings on this platen. It is hard.  I'm sure it will peg my Durometers at 100.  Neither go above 100 Shore A.

 

A note on taking photos while driving.  It is much easier with a 35mm SLR.  Set the camera for 1/125 sec. at f16 and use a 100 to 200 speed film.  Digital cameras are much more involved, especially when the autofocus focuses off the glass. 

Photographing while driving is like shooting a shotgun, aim without much looking, press the shutter release, and you get what you get because you cannot take your eyes off the road. 

Blogger Security ALERT. If you keep old blogs on your blog list .....

 If you keep old blogs on your blog list beware that many are now links to malicious  sites.  I just noted and update on some inactive blogs, across Google and WP that are linked to risky sites.

 

My list may get quite short in a few minutes. 

 

Looks like most links have gotten hi-jacked.  At least on my blog. Not sure how much Blogger code I can see to even guess what is going on. 

 

If I have blocked or removed your blog from my bloglist, please leave a comment or send an email and I will re-add it.  I did not take time to trace each malicious.

 

I will miss revisiting even the inactive blogs as they do contain great information. 

101 Years Old and Still going Strong

 

 

After I read over the typecast I noticed I typed the incorrect date.  I HATE when I need to reinsert a document to make a correction as no matter how good I guestimate where the type slug will strike, it is generally not aligned.

 

 

 

I have many photos from the early 1900s (and earlier), and most are Sepia toned.  I'm not sure I like the way the Canon SW-10 (or any digital camera does Sepia)

I measured the Durometer of the platen and find it is about 97 - 98 Shore A.  Not quite as soft as a new platen or a recovered platen, but not rock hard unusable either.

 

The left and right feed roller measure 95 Durometer Shore A.

None of the feed rollers have detectable flat spots. 

 

These readings make me wonder if the platen was recovered in the past Century, and the feed rollers replaced.  I know I could not do a proper measurement of the feed rollers in the carriage, but to approximate the accuracy of the reading, I could indent the feed rollers with my thumb nail, but not the platen.  Both of my Shore A Durometers are -1 of the calibration test standard.  Both measured the platen to the same reading.

1925 Royal 10

Optional Long-winded discussion of measuring Durometer...

 

I forgot to type about the correct method for checking cylindrical rubber items Durometer.  It is easy to spot check only one area and think that is the Durometer of the platen.  That is not how to check Durometer.  

 

The more areas tested, the more accurate the result for the entire cylinder, in this case 2 or more cylinders: the platen and as many feed roller accessible without removing the parts.

 

I test Durometer with a standard Shore A Durometer and 1kg standard (+/-10g is fine.  Mine is good to +/- 1g, but if not for lab surplus would not be affordable) lab weight.  The weight is required for consistent pressure on the Durometer upon the unit under test. 

 

The tricky part is keeping the Durometer flat upon the platen, and much more difficult for the pressure rollers.  

 

Off the carriage I use machinist's V-blocks to hold the parts to make measuring easier.

 

Measure the platen every 90° at each end (I measure the ends and about 1 or 2 inches in since that is where the paper fits) and in the middle by placing the Durometer flat onto the platen and while holding it with one hand, place the weight flat the on the top .  The weight will need balancing with your hand using the sides only.  Note the readings and then average to get a Mean Durometer of XX Shore A.

 

I make pencil marks along one end of the platen so I can get close to every 90°, or 1/4 revolution. 

 

In the carriage I can generally measure 2 places on the left and right end feed rollers.

Due to the size I can only get the Durometer in the center or as close as possible to center.

I try and get 2 readings.

 

I have several Adler platens and I think and Olympia that measure softer on the left half of the platen and harder on the right.  None of the machines indicate the right half of the typewriter sat in the sun or heat longer than the right. 

 

The Canon Powershot SX10is Takes a Walk on the Fruitl Belt Rail Trail. Oshetemo, Michigan's Newest Trail.

 

You can read about this trail here.

Entering the trail South end at Flesher Field

 

Landscape mode, 1/68 sec, F4.0, ISO 100

B & W mode, 1/320 sec. F4, ISO 100

 

A little farther along the trail.  B & W mode 1/30 sec., F3.5, ISO 200

B & W mode, 1/25 sec., F5.7, ISO 800

 

The trail goes under canopies of oaks and various trees.  This image and the one below were each taken at 1/25 Sec., F5.7, ISO 400

I decided to see how the Sepia mode worked as I rounded the turn in the very top of the color image above.  1/30 sec., F2.8, ISO 400

The canopy is starting to show its fall colors. 1/200 sec., F4, ISO 400

Yellow 1 filter. 1/200 sec. F4, ISO 400

Green 2, 1/60 sec., F4 ISO 400

Red  25  1/60sec., F3.5, ISO 400

 

Blogger is going crazy again and will not let me add captions.  When I click to add a  caption the image gets inserted between images above.  If I try to add it by making extra space between images the image gets deleted.  

The B & W squirrel image above is a black squirrel I spied being chased by another black squirrel.  When it stopped on the log I managed to get a few images 'off the cuff' as I did not really get much time to capture the B & W .  I changed back to color and got the image at the top where the squirrel is trying to eat the walnut.

As I walked along the trail I saw some moss covered logs.  Goody!  I get to test the AF on a mossy log again even though this moss is quite shaggy compared to what did not focus.

AF worked and a comparison of color to B  & W. 

Blogger put these 2 images quite far below the others.  I did not try to move them since things are not working as they should.

I saw the deer at the first bridge.  Not expecting it after doing some B &W for plants, I quickly got off a shot.  I kept watching it, but the very slow and non focusing AF in D-zoom I was unable to do much at a distance.  I slowly walked toward the deer so I could hopefully use optical only zoom, but a lady was approaching so I did not get to do what I wanted.  The deer in color is as close as I could get.  The deer would not look at me as it did previously.

The final image is the second bridge on the trail.  These are not actual bridges, but fences to protect people from falling off the berm as this is an old RR bed there are high places that were filled in to provide level surfaces for trains.  Some of these banks are quite high and steep.

I have many more usable and non-usable images and may do another post with the some of the usable ones. 

 

Canon SX10is View of the Lilian Anderson Arboretum

In this post  I mentioned taking an early morning walk in the forest.

I did not mention where or when I may post on it.

Here is where I went for a walk. 

 

 The Lilian Anderson Arboretum is owned and maintained by Kalamazoo College

  

Walking past the sign and entering the Arboretum

At the end of the main entrance path is the Batts Pavilion.

 

I often walk around by the weather station to the pavilion when I am there near sunrise. 

 OH, Blogger is up top its b.............. again. I tried to put this in the caption, but it cuts it off. It also cuts it off here.

 This visit I walked from the entrance on the main path to the pavilion which scared the deer 

That are usually there.  I wonder is WP any better than Blooger.  Seems Google keeps messing with stuff. 

 

Without even attempting to caption any more images this post. My experience tells me 

Once Blogger goes nuts it stays that way. 

I I kept the ISO at 80 when I saw these deer and got a Lomography kind of image.

Lomography promotes taking photos that can but do not need to be perfect.  At one time light leaks were a popular effect, then blurred, And always interesting in focus nicely done images. 

 

Now Blogger will not center images.
 

 

So the images do not get messed-up by blogger I will continue at the end.

I walked through the forest and the sun rose and more light was available so I got some images of interesting trees.

 

The last image is one of our favorite spots for bird watching.  In spring and summer the trees  shown are filled with birds of all kinds.  Later in summer they are filled with Gold Finches.

This is the path as I am exiting the Arboretum going to the main path.

 

I like that the Arboretum adjoins the Main Street Park in Oshtemo.  This park is behind the township building and has a nice hiking area with many paths, some of which are minimally maintained making it not so crowded as many larger paths.

  

Preview looked ok, so hopefully the real post will be fine. 

Using Filters on the Canon SX10is

 

Typecast, not images, sent from the typewriter.  Wouldn't it be neat if we could send images other than those typing kind from a typewriter?  NO, that would make it something other than a typewriter.

Polarizing filter, slightly more blue sky

No polarizing filter

No filter shows more reflection from the leaves

Polarizing filter reduces reflection from the leaves and may brighten the roses a bit

Yellow with custom white balance

Blue.  I forgot my lens hood is for a 36mm lens and the native focal distance on the SX10 is 28mm (35mm equivalent)

Green did not work very good, red was worse,  I knew in color I'd get the filter color.

Blue with custom white balance.  I wonder is the sensor blue sensitive since correcting WB caused over exposure of the cloud edge towards the sun.

Unfiltered sky

 Red and green did not do much with custom white balance so I did not post them. I need to try some other white balance adjustments to see if they can be made work on color images.  

 

First CHDK image showing my ultrasloppy desk.  

I did some early morning typing and minor repairs before the typecast

I like typing outside.  I often go to a park or type on the table on our deck if I don't type very early.  Very early does not happen in MI after September when the sun does not rise until 0630.  Now it is more like 0740.

Time is relative. Here I am at the far end of the Eastern time zone so we are nearly an hour behind sunrise from where I lived in PA and about 1 1/2 behind when I was on Cape Cod.  VA was not much different than PA, and FL was about the same and got about the same amount of sun year round with sunrise hardly ever much earlier than 0530 summer or 0630 in winter. 

The Webster needed a newer ribbon so I stole it from the other Webster along with the spring that fits in front of the vibrator.

I reattached the torsion spring for the paper tray, replace the broken front spring, and installed a better ribbon.  Then I typed 2 pages of nonsensical random thoughts while listening to one of my Zenith Trans-Oceanic radios.  The ZTO requires a separate typecast/

I also enjoyed some Presbyterian tobacco in my E.A. Carey pipe, could also spawn another typecast.
 

Believe it or not the temperature is 72 degrees F since I got up at 0400.  This is like summer.