4 Responses to Cyberstalking previous owners of your typewriter, and the News From Lake Woebegone

1. Richard P says:

   February 23, 2013 at 8:21 am

   Thanks to Mr. Cheatham for identifying himself for the benefit of future typewriteristas!

   That Rem Rand 1 is a beautiful model, one of my favorites visually.

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   • munk says:

     February 24, 2013 at 10:17 pm

     Yeah, I keep it mainly because of the visual attractiveness. I don’t much like to type on it. :P

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2. ProfessorC says:

   February 26, 2013 at 5:47 pm

   The Selectric III you have uses a “bicycle” ribbon (also known as the “210″ ribbon or 1299508). This was a ribbon cartridge version that was a running change from the first Selectric III’s that were built using the same cartridge as the Selectric II’s previously (1299095). Oddly enough, the last of the production Selectric III’s changed back to the Selectric II ribbon.

   By far, the most common return problems on Selectrics is a stretched or missing torque-limiter spring. Without this spring, the torque-limiter will slip and prevent a full carriage return before releasing.

   Removing the gooey, deteriorated foam is the least appealing part of Selectric refurbishing. It’s nasty, dirty work, but necessary. It’s so satisfying to remove that crumbling mess and replace it with nice, new foam. They are much quieter with the foam than without.

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   • munk says:

     February 26, 2013 at 6:09 pm

     having worked on it a bit, I got it returning at first sluggishly, and then smoothly, but only if I advance the carriage using the TAB key. I can TAB anywhere along the carriage and hit return and it comes back smoothly, but if I type anything or use the space bar, even after or before tabbing, the return will only come back a bit and stop. if you hit return repeatedly, it goes back a bit more each time until it returns to the left margin.

     I’ve cleaned and lubed the entire carriage system, and can’t see anything obviously broken. Guess I’ll be working on this one awhile. :P

     Reply