[GreenKeys] Well, it's not a Teletype

[Richard Knoppow]

-----Original Message-----
>From: John Nagle <nagle at animats.com>
>Sent: Apr 19, 2011 12:00 AM
>To: greenkeys at mailman.qth.net
>Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] Well, it's not a Teletype
>
>> The insides look like a variable speed disk drive. I think a recorder
>> would be steady speed but a reader or tape puller would be variable.
>> It appears to have connections for something on the back with nice
>> big RF chokes in the line. Except for the contacts it looks like the
>> puller for a morse ink set up.
>
>    It's clearly a mechanical wheel-and-disc variable speed drive that
>drives perforated tape of some kind.  We can't see what the
>mechanism under the tape head is, though.  The speed dial has
>markings from 10 to 200.
>
>    The manufacturer is "RFL Industries" (previously Radio Frequency
>Labs, later Dowty RFL Industries) of Boonton, New Jersey, founded
>by Richard W. Seabury in the 1920s.  They built various kinds of
>instrumentation and magnetics gear into at least the 1990s.
>
>    It might be a degausser for magnetic-stripe film.  At one time,
>it was common to use sprocket-driven fully magnetically coated
>film for audio recording in film production.  The audio gear
>was independent of the photographic gear, but both were
>sprocketed and they were locked together electrically.
>
>See
>
>http://www.folkstreams.net/vafp/clip.php?id=52
>
>for what a reel of 16mm full-coat looked like.
>
>    But the transport looks like it would be too harsh on a
>magnetic material, and is too narrow for 16mm.
>
>				John Nagle

     Its not a magnetic film degausser. The sprocket drive has perforations in the center and is the wrong size. Film recording was done on regular 35mm or 16mm film. 
     It certainly would be interesting to see what's in it. Perhaps I will write to the seller to see if he can supply any more information. Its possible its a transmitter of some sort, that would explain the terminals on the back. The calibrations could well be WPM if its a morse transmitter or tape puller. I think McElroy made similar machines. 
     I am reminded of an old television show called "What in the World" where three archeaoligists were asked to identify some ancient artifact. Not quite the Antiques Road Show.