WoC: “Mothra” 1972 IBM Selectric Composer #5016537 
Reminder for me how the ribbon winds onto the spools and which way is “top”. Trust me, I did it wrong *TWICE* :D 
Way back in 2015, I picked up a working Selectric Composer which I named “Mothra”, and at the time I think it was probably the only working Composer in collector hands. Since then, I’ve seen a couple of them restored by Clark Hinson for customers, and now in 2024, there have been even more restored and working in the hands of other collectors/restorers. The latest one I’ve seen was restored by Otto Koponen – and he’s added some custom touches that should excite the handful of us Composer owners. The first is 3-D printed ribbon spools and ribbon lift attachments that allow you to use a normal 1/2″ cloth ribbon on the Composer! The second touch he added was a 3-D printed badge declaring his machine as “King Ghidorah” – and he has a second machine he’s dubbed “Rodan” so it’s becoming clear that we have a theme going with these monsters – Erik B had better grab the name “Godzilla” for his MT/SC unit before it gets taken by someone else! :D 
Otto Koponen’s King Ghidorah 
This is yet another example of how 3-D printing and other small-scale parts manufacturing has been used lately to improve the lot of us typewriter collectors, not only to replace factory parts, but also in a very creative way to make parts that have never existed to *improve* the function of the machines and to extend the life of the platform in the face of dwindling consumables. Adding the ability to use cloth ribbons on the Composer means we can finally stop burning up the very few Composer ribbons left and even the hack of using Type 71 ribbons, which are plentiful but usually decades old, slightly the wrong size and not the same carbon formulation as the Composer ones. Also – COLORS! :D
And while I can’t test it because I lack a Selectric 71 model, I would guess that if I can use Type 71 ribbons in my Composer, then these spools can be used to load a cloth ribbon into a Type 71 machine. That right there expands the potential market for this spool system from the half-dozen Composer owners in the world to anyone who owns a carbon-ribbon Selectric 71. If Otto hasn’t considered that, I should toss that idea at him – might improve the chances that he’ll make a batch of them to sell.
Can you believe how the typewriter community has grown and matured? When I needed replacement feet for my typewriters 5 years ago, I had to set up my own rubber-pouring station and learn how to make molds and cast the feet myself. Nowadays, there are probably a dozen typewriter shops and small-scale manufacturers making 3-D printed and hand-cast typewriter feet for a very wide range of typewriters. Just a few years ago we were *losing* typewriter shops, with shop owners retiring or passing away with very few shops being passed to a new generation of repairmen – Now? I’ve lost count of how many new typewriter shops have opened and are still being established. All of it very, very encouraging! :D
All Selectric Composers in TWDB (Composers got assigned model ID sixty-nine – yeah baby! :D)
Otto is nothing short of pure awesomeness. I’m happy to witness his work firsthand on the typewriter discord. He’s also amassing a huge number of typewriter related documents and making them available through the internet archive. Have you seen the “semi erotical” Robotron ad he found?
No, I havent – url? :D
Here’s the Robotron ad(s), I’d definitely call it “fully erotical” though. 😅
https://archive.org/details/robotron-typewriter-ads
And the rest of my collection: https://archive.org/details/typewriterephemera
Well now – this is yet another one of those times I wish I’d learned German – this lack really hinders my ability to learn from basically half the typewriter documentation that exists. :P
Fantastic collection of scans, tho! :D
for instance, *this* looks like a golden addition to the Rheinmetall age list, if I can figure out what it says. I’ll have to jam that through Translate and see if I can make sense of it:
https://ia800502.us.archive.org/17/items/rheinmetall-changes-to-typewriters-german_202311/Rheinmetall%20Changes%20To%20Typewriters%20%28German%29.pdf
Now might be the time for me to brush up on my German!
Kind of a silly question: How come most typewriter documentation is in German? Were most typewriters manufactured in Germany, or perhaps the Germans just keep better records?
Gunier: not most documentation, but about half-ish. It’s because most of the typewriters produced in Europe came from German companies. Later books on typewriters were often written in German because most European collectors & researchers were/are also German. Basically, the largest bulk of documentation is either in English or German because that’s where the manufacturing was.
His ephemera collection: https://archive.org/details/typewriterephemera
The Robotron ad: https://archive.org/details/robotron-typewriter-ads
It’s the first one.
Cool and clever hacks! Thanks for sharing.