Maybe not identical, but certainly reminiscent, to me.

Uwe wrote:

Repartee wrote:

Could it have been a safety thing? "New break-away return lever prevents impalement in office falls!"?...

Oddly enough, there was a sharp decline in office impalements around the time that the Empress was introduced...  

Here is what Royal had to say about this return lever...

Valiant wrote:

I think the writer of that manual was one heck of a spin-doctor!

I fully agree. That claptrap was only written to distract buyers from the reality of a cost cutting measure. I suppose they couldn't have written: "Notice that we're now using plastic instead of a chrome plated, heavy-duty metal lever. This cost saving measure helps to keep our machines competitively priced."

Actually, I'm even more surprised that they refer to it as a "return lever" when the more standard nomenclature is line space lever. I've never liked return lever because it implies it's solidly fixed and the only thing it does is return the carriage to the left margin stop. In reality you can use a line space lever without moving the carriage at all.
 

Of course I can't touch your clipper, but I can just about fall in love with the beautiful 1930's image of the flying boat! Those planes suggest romance and adventure in tropical places.

As to falling in love and not wanting to part with something, I've noticed my reaction to objects possessed for something beyond mere utility is bipolar - either I love it and want to keep it, or else if I don't love it <don't let anybody here hear me write such a blasphemy> and I am really tempted to euthanize it. I know, it's an evil thought! But two machines which fall in the latter category are a grey Remington portable with an uncushioned keyboard feel and a feed roller in the cross section of a "D", and an East German machine which suggests what happens when people who remember how to build a good quality product must produce in a poor communist country. They tried their hardest. Actually they almost succeeded, since the machine still works decently except for a stripped plastic gear in one of the spool assemblies. Yes, plastic.

Somebody talk me down! I may hurt them.

Uwe wrote:

...How about pulling the veil of secrecy off of these two machines and tell us which models you're talking about?

I will take the lazy way right now and post links to photo... wait... am I allowed to "post" photos I don't own?





It is technically feasible at least.

These are similar models, though of course clean and dressed in their Sunday finest while the two in my possession are a little down at the heels. I do like the looks of the Remington, I must admit, and it has a sharp elite typeface. I could just wish a previous owner had read the advice in the same Royal manual which I posted part of earlier:

     "At the end of each day it is a good practice to pull the Paper Release Lever forward so that the rubber feed rolls do not tend to develop flat surfaces"

Sure, if you are going to use the typewriter every day this will not be an issue, but what if you close up the machine at the end of the day and nobody comes back for thirty years! You get a D-shaped roller. Nobody anticipates the thirty year weekend. It just happens.