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05-5-2015 05:08:51  #1


The bigtime: going to the repairman!

Okay, with the purchase of my Hermes 3000, which I knew the minute I opened it was like some sort of long-lost soulmate, I have made a resolution. I am going to stop buying typewriters and focus instead on sorting out the ones I already have. (Actually the resolution came both before that, and also after not winning a seafoam 2000 on eBay; but you get the drift. It's abput quality not quantity.)

This is husbandry. It"s a little paradoxical (& unfortunate) that getting a typewriter repaired is going to be more expensive than buying another typewriter, especially as the main problem I have here is a load of rock-hard platens; but still it is husbandry, and there is no point at all in buying another typewriter that then just sits there *needing repairs* that I can't do, like a cross between a reproach and a debt to the universe.

I'm such a magpie, and such a (sort of spendthrift) skinflint, that this feels like a massive resolution. And I've had a brilliant time (& will continue to do so) learning how these machines work, and cleaning them and getting them going again as best I can. (And if this resolution is anything like my regular 'no book-buying' resolutions, there's bound to be some little bargain before long...) But there ARE times when you simply need to call someone in. And the whole ethos of the typewriter, andwhy we love it so, is that if you get it repaired it will keep going for years, os you're investing in the future. It's beyond that kind of hollow, shallow consumerism that makes us just want more, more, more... So, I've written to Tom the Typewriter Man and have plans already for the first two I'm going to take to him. GULP.

And YAY!

And, you know, it's not as if I had a car... 
 

Last edited by KatLondon (05-5-2015 05:12:29)

 

05-5-2015 10:50:13  #2


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

If Tom doesn't mind, it would be nice if you could take a few pictures of your adventure. He's an active and valuable member here and it would nice to see him get a little visual recognition.

(I moved this from the Repairs to Type Talk sub-forum only because it's more of a philosophical and experience-related thread).


The pronoun has always been capitalized in the English language for more than 700 years.
 

05-5-2015 12:21:57  #3


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

Just emailed the same person! I think! I'm not even much of a collector, I only have the one but I really want it to work! It looks too cute to try another straight away! I hope I'll be able to get it sorted. Little further from Luton though unfortunately

 

05-5-2015 13:38:29  #4


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

I'm excited for you Kat.  Ill be excited to hear how they turn out.

Last edited by Spazmelda (05-5-2015 18:01:44)

 

05-5-2015 18:13:01  #5


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

I'm with you, Spazmelda! I am hating the feeling of having things here that can't type well. Your collection sounds smallish but great. 

I got that little Olympia Progress the other week - for a specific purpose, for an art exhibition - and trying it out in the people's flat, it seemed to type really well. It was after I got it home I noticed the way the platen was throwing the type bars off it. Then I noticed how the 'o' was misaligned - and no other letters - then I noticed that the slug is actually off, and is only sort of sitting there in (or not quite in) position... now I'm thinking do I get that fixed for the exhibition (I just don't know that a 1935 model is ever going to supplant my SM8 or the Hermes...) or do I use the Hermes 2000 for that once it's fixed, and just sell the Olympia? Jaysus. If it wasn't for the money... and if we're talking old machines, I have a 1940 Remington that I feel a little more in love with. 

By the way, Tom the Typewriter Man has told me that Hermes typewriters were fitted with strangely hard platens from the factory so by now they are almost all hard as a rock. I've only had my 3000 for five days and the platen is making holes in the paper... so that will need doing too, in the long ru (I'm just making sure I use a backing sheet for now, not ideal but better). I really might as well get a car. I have got some tough choices to make here. 

Uwe, no worries re which forum it's in. And I'm happy to do a little photographic record but am only handing over at the train station... I can definitely do before shots, and a station handover pic. Scenic Luton. And we'll see. Might be able to persuade the other half to drive up there for the pick-up...

Spazmelda, re your list, my initial list of typewriters to repair goes something like: 
1. 1955 Hermes 2000 - it cleaned up beautifully (what I can reach) and is a GREAT typer, but has broken bits all over it. 
2. 1951 Swissa Piccola, has never worked aand the problem/s are a mystery... 
3. Hermes 3000, new platen rubber
4. Olympia progress?? Or the Remington Rand that a man bought in 1946 in Argentina, after he had just gone blind from fever while working for the UK government in Africa - he returned to Britain and used that typewriter for 50 years - & wore the  platen so hard that bare metal shows through it. I love it for the story alone... I got it from his daughter for 99p plus postage. And then the rest... But there's a limit!

Ohhh, and then there's the SG3, which still has rust issues I think. And the paper feed rollers are split. Uwe, I think, suggested shrink-to-fit rubber tubing, but this sounds a bit technical to me. I use it fine by feeding the paper through from the front.  Love that machine. 

     Thread Starter
 

05-5-2015 19:48:28  #6


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

The Remington Rand story is so cool.

I erased my list, lol. Just in case anyone was wondering what you were talking about.  I think I kind of got this thread and the most recent 'tell about your collection' thread conflated in my head.  When I went back through and read, my list seemed out of place here.

 

05-5-2015 20:58:39  #7


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

Ooooh... I remember going to the repairman. I had to get my Olympia SM-9 fixed, so I went to Gramercy in Manhattan NYC, and it's a magical place there. Not sure if all shops are the same, but it was filled with typewriters. From floor to the top of the roof, just tons of Royals, Olympias, Remingtons, Underwoods, Smith-Corona, Hermes, and I think even a Princess. Try not to buy everything there...


A high schooler with a lot of typewriters. That's pretty much about it.
 

11-5-2015 10:43:23  #8


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

Hi everybody, I'm on the train back to town, having just dropped off my Hermes 2000 with The Typewriter Man in Luton. We recognised each other instantly - he was the one who looked like he spends his time working with beloved machines, and I guess I was the one sitting there with a Hermes 2000 case sticking out of a bag. We had a good look at my machine, sitting there on the seats by the ticket barrier, and then chatted for longer than his free parking probably allowed, but a lot shorter than we could have! What a thoroughly lovely guy. I don't want to overpraise as I know he reads these threads and might be embarrassed, but seriously.  He is the exact opposite of the hipster repair guys I had that run-in with at Christmas - about whom we had a very nice little gossip!

He is a smiley fellow, really interested in people, and he loves typewriters - and other machines. there is a sort of thing I think you can spot in people who have a deep interest in, and knowledge & love of a thing. Especially people who work with their hands. I come from a family of people who make things and I've always made things - and I think you just recognise one of your own tribe. This is one of the chief delights of th Typosphere, isn't it. It's about having that love of things that people have made.

Anyway. Tom even reckons he can get my 1951 Baby going again! He has a spare, and the thing that's shot on it is not the bit that's shot on miine. Hurrah! But that's for another time...

We talked about all kinds of things - a recent job he's worked on restoring three wartime tyewriters to as-new condition for the National Trust, for example - and he swore me to secrecy on a couple of things. <smug face> I didn't take a picture, either, sorry Uwe. Thought he might like to reserve his mystique.

So the deal is, he is going to take a day or two to look at the 2000 and then send me an estimate. Certain things we know: it needs a new platen, and that's going to be £110. I'm lucky it can even happen - the only reason the company even still does it for him is that they've known him so long. AND it's going to need a new carriage return lever and possibly space bar (though that's cosmetic) off a spare machine he has, and it may need some other things... 

The big news is that it has been dropped. Just two days ago it started playing up a lot around the margins and tab area, and I was showing him. And then he said: I bet that's been dropped. He turned it over and said, Yes! It has. See, here's how I can tell, and he showed me a place at the back where a little bit of the body was a tiny bit bent from the impact. But he says he has had other Hermes machines in a worse state from being dropped and he's 'brought them back'. 

God I hope so. I got the machine for only £3, but I love it. 

And that's it! More to follow when I get the diagnosis. Ask anything and I'll asnwer it if I can.

     Thread Starter
 

11-5-2015 11:32:02  #9


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

Sounds like you had a pleasant visit. I will be interested in hearing the final damage. Hopefully it won't be too bad. You will have to post before and after pics when it's all gorgeous.

I'm doing terribly at not buying typewriters until I get the ones I have in tip top shape. I did sort out the case issues on my safari. Turns out it was missing some screws that hold the carriage casings on. I luckily had a bag of small screws that I had purchased for another hobby that happened to fit.

Last edited by Spazmelda (11-5-2015 13:09:05)

 

11-5-2015 12:27:37  #10


Re: The bigtime: going to the repairman!

The awful, hideous truth: I somehow won an auction on my holy grail, a Royal Quiet De Luxe that looks like about 1953. Am negotiating re shipping with the seller... 

Well done on the screws!

     Thread Starter
 

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