1 of 1- overwood
- Speed Champion
Offline - From: Midwest
- Registered: 10-11-2018
- Posts: 299
SM4 linkage disconnected
There is one key with disconnected linkage on my new SM4, and horror of horrors! It's my favorite key! The !!!!! key!!
Hard to get a picture but probably not necessary anyway. Its the little cm long wire with hooked ends that links the key lever with the type bar. It is still hooked into the type bar (or some intermediate part of the mechanism). I am trying to use forceps to urge it back into its home on the key lever and I might still succeed, but I wonder if it will stay there. It doesn't look bent, but it must have come out for a reason. Anyway I will keep trying, but if there is a sure-fire fix let me know.
Oh well dang, NVM, Google and poor Duane are my friends again.
- Pete E.
- Typewriter Talk Elite
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- From: Idaho - USA
- Registered: 23-6-2020
- Posts: 2,681
Re: SM4 linkage disconnected
I have had a couple of machines coming to me with a missing C-link...not even in the bottom of the case.
I used a large paper-clip on one and some piano-wire on the other.
That metal is a bit softer and easier to bend and I would form one end of the new link in a 90-degree bend and once the link is in place, I could pinch both ends of the new link a bit closed...more so than the factory links.
.
- overwood
- Speed Champion
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- From: Midwest
- Registered: 10-11-2018
- Posts: 299
Re: SM4 linkage disconnected
Yeah this is tricky. I don't have a nifty little bending rod like Duane used, and have not been able to get the link back in yet. I will keep trying things. In the meantime the old fashioned method of typing exclamation marks still works, and if I have to I can try the paper clip trick. I'm fresh out of pianos.
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Thread Starter- overwood
- Speed Champion
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- From: Midwest
- Registered: 10-11-2018
- Posts: 299
Re: SM4 linkage disconnected
Courtesy of a peg board hook and a hacksaw, I'll soon have a nifty little bending tool.
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Thread Starter- overwood
- Speed Champion
Offline
- From: Midwest
- Registered: 10-11-2018
- Posts: 299
Re: SM4 linkage disconnected
Link reconnected. This may have happened before I bought it, or not, but when I reconnected it and straightened the lever the ribbon was not raising high enough for that key to fully print, and only that key. I flipped to the red setting and now all works as it should. But clearly something is still wrong, although I may never notice.
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Thread Starter- M. Höhne
- Key Master
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- From: Maine
- Registered: 14-3-2013
- Posts: 652
Re: SM4 linkage disconnected
overwood wrote:
Link reconnected. --- snip --- when I reconnected it and straightened the lever the ribbon was not raising high enough for that key to fully print, and only that key. I flipped to the red setting and now all works as it should. But clearly something is still wrong, --- snip ---
The length of that link affects the travel of the typebar, so check that and adjust. I hope the refinement will not require fitting a different link!
- overwood
- Speed Champion
Offline
- From: Midwest
- Registered: 10-11-2018
- Posts: 299
Re: SM4 linkage disconnected
Link reconnected. --- snip --- when I reconnected it and straightened the lever the ribbon was not raising high enough for that key to fully print, and only that key. I flipped to the red setting and now all works as it should. But clearly something is still wrong, --- snip ---
The length of that link affects the travel of the typebar, so check that and adjust. I hope the refinement will not require fitting a different link!
I used the existing link, which was still attached at one end and appears to be the proper, original link as far as I can tell. It appears identical to the others. But the key lever does not rest on the actuator bar (pardon my terminology) for the vibrator, so the ribbon doesn't start to rise immediately when pressing the key. It has to travel a bit before the ribbon starts rising, unlike all the other keys. I can see where this COULD be caused by a link that is too short, but I'm just not sure it isn't something else.
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Thread Starter