I think there's nothing in that triangular piece... The larger part which moves guided by the selector just seems to slide over it, but here I'm talking from my memory. Today I didn't get the chance to take a closer look, I bet this week is the toughest at work of the whole year for me...

Anyway, I haven't tinkered too much with that typewriter, so I don't know if the touch control works properly. It's damaged and waiting to be repaired, hence the dirt everywhere. In fact, it makes a loud CRRRRACK when returning the carriage, and upon closer inspectionone of the clamps that holds the platen and allow for quick removal is broken. Maybe it's been hit hard, but even if it's the case I doubt something could have fallen off the touch control system.

But after all I'd still say there's no spoo... Er, spring. 

I´m trying to upload the images to Tinypic, and it keeps failing. At first it looked like everything was alright with the first pic, then the second appeared as no longer there and the third flat-out failed.

On the third try (that is, 9 different uploads, 9 different capchas and 9 curses), that´s what I get...





If this has something to do with the file name, somebody at tinypic has reached dangerous levels of incompetence, comparable to eBay. The files were named ss1, ss2 and ss3, three tries with each of them. I seriously hope it´s nothing to do with WW2 SS, I mean, maybe there´s something that directly eliminates them jut in case someone tries to upload nazi stuff or something, but then I changed the name to uss1, uss2 and uss3, and surprisingly the first one appears as uploaded, the secound one doesn´t and I bet by the time I post this the first one has dissapeared as well.

What´s wrong with tinypic, then?
 

It has. Tomorrow I'll take the photos and upload them.

I find this extremely interesting! I had wondered about that weird layout after my visits to Evora and Lisbon, and in fact I turned down a couple of typewriters at the mercado das ladras because I couldn't figure that out. I thiught that was a shoddy repair or something, as if someone had tried to change the keytops and then randomly rearranged them!

So, now I have another question: which layout was used before HCESAR? And another one: does it have much impact changing layouts? And yet another one: Was HCESAR really faster? What defines a faster layout and how can you decide which one is faster? It started as a single questin, but things escalated quickly.

In some previous thread I mentioned this very issue, and here's the answer. Cool!

Speaking of which, is the SF in any way similar to the Splendid 33? If so, it must be a really good machine. And so far, Olympia beats Hermes for me. Not by much, though. But a second generation Baby versus a Splendid 33 has a clear result, clearer than in other potential matches: Olympia wins.

As a final note, I´ve still to try a third generation Baby, so I´m a bit lost here an my opinion is quite pointless because it doesn´t address the OP´s question.