1 of 1- igotztowrite
- Touch Typist
Offline - From: California, USA
- Registered: 08-11-2015
- Posts: 109
Imperial - Carriage Ball Bearings
I'm working on a newly acquired Imperial Good Companion (i believe a 5, could be a 4) Carriage is wobbly, I can move it back and forth. I removed the platen and notice that there are only 2 carriage ball bearings. From what I can see, there should be a total of 8 (4 in front and 4 in back)
Any suggestions on acquiring the missing bearings?
It looks like a nice machine otherwise ...
- igotztowrite
- Touch Typist
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- From: California, USA
- Registered: 08-11-2015
- Posts: 109
Re: Imperial - Carriage Ball Bearings
The bearings aren't completely round. Do I refer to them as "ball bearings" or just "bearings"?
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Last edited by Uwe (21-6-2016 11:15:30)
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Thread Starter- Uwe
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- From: Toronto, Canada
- Registered: 12-3-2013
- Posts: 4,408
Re: Imperial - Carriage Ball Bearings
They're not round? I assume they are cylindrical then? Never had the carriage off an Imperial, but that's good to know, especially since such a bearing might be more difficult to source.
I don't know where you're located, so can't suggest anything local to you, but there are a large number of bearing suppliers online you could order from once you know the exact dimension of the original. I use a local bearing supplier, so depending on where you live you might have a similar retailer in your area too.
The pronoun I has always been capitalized in the English language for more than 700 years.
- thetypewriterman
- Key Master
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- From: Leiston, England
- Registered: 29-5-2013
- Posts: 900
Re: Imperial - Carriage Ball Bearings
Your best source would be some good secondhand ones from a parts machine - if anyone on here can help ? They might be the same diameter on other Imperial models.
The next option would be a bearing supplier. These are called 'rollers'. One can only hope that they are a standard size, but knowing that Imperial was a 'vertically integrated company' they may well have made them 'in house' to a non-standard size. As a last resort, an engineer - or a friend who is into model engineering - could make them to sample from silver steel. This would be softer than a normal roller but for use on a portable typewriter carriage, perfectly adequate. Rollers are sometimes used in applications like motorcycle engine 'big ends' so typewriter use is pretty small beer by comparison. Final thought. Surprisingly, these could be a metric size. The 'odd' numbered Imperial portables were heavily based on the German Torpedo portable.
- M. Höhne
- Key Master
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- From: Maine
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Re: Imperial - Carriage Ball Bearings
igotztowrite wrote:In the US, if the bearings are spherical, they're called ball bearings; if they're cylindrical, they're called roller bearings; if they're truncated cones (unlikely in a typewriter) they're called tapered roller bearings. If the separate little pieces are held together in a framework, they are called caged [whatever kind] bearings. (The main purpose of the cages is to make machine assembly easier and if the specified caged bearings are not available, they can usually be replaced by loose balls, rollers to nearly fill the race. The race is the track where the bearing roll.) If the bearing is simply a round shaft turning inside another solid piece, they're called bushings or bushed bearings, the solid thing around the shaft being the bushing. HTH
Is Uwe right, the bearings in your Imperial are cylindrical?
- igotztowrite
- Touch Typist
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- From: California, USA
- Registered: 08-11-2015
- Posts: 109
Re: Imperial - Carriage Ball Bearings
Yeeks! I'm more a visual person which means I have a hard time calling a store or ordering parts from the internet LOL Usually, I lug the typewriter into the hardware store to match what is needed or test it's fitting.
I'm impressed with ALL the knowledge here. I'll post a photo of the actual bearing this weekend. Thanks once again!
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Thread Starter