Light / heavy
Precise-firm / rattly-wobbly-loose
quick / sluggish
secure / insecure
friendly / unfriendly

Javi wrote:

I´d add reliable / unreliable. That´s a defining factor for me.

A reliable typewriter is one which works as it´s supposed to do, and since we´re dealing with machines at least decades old (or even a century old) many things can go wrong. Sometimes you´re in the thick of it and suddenly something cuts the flow and you find yourself fixing some tiny little problem instead of writing. That reliability is key.

Agreed - this has happened to me and it colors the way you look at the machine. Competent machines are beautiful no matter what while troublesome machines have a shallow beauty at best.

One element of touch or feel is how the action accumulates energy during the key stroke. The poles would be accumulating energy throughout the stroke and accumulating insignificant energy and merely serving as a linkage between fingertip and typeface. If you are expecting the first and getting the second you will not have good things to say about that typewriter, while a person expecting the latter and accustomed to it will defend the honor of that machine.

 

To describe the hundreds of typewriters I've used over the last 35 years is going to be a really tough proposition at best.  But, I can tell you this:  Among American standard upright typewriters, Underwood SX 150 machines have a shorter keystroke than most--I've measured it, but forgot what the measurement was--just that it was shorter, so it has a little bit different a feel.  It does have a comfortable feel--not mushy or stiff.  You can feel the type bars hit the platen.  I like the machines that have a little snap to them.  I like feelin' those typebars hit!  Olympia SG typewriters are a shade mushy, but I do like using them.  Olivetti--Yuck!!  Mushy is heck.  Stick a spoon in the keyboard and stir it up.  Electric typewriters even have a uniqueness to them--portables and uprights.  Olympia electrics are a little tinny, but they are very fast, and very neat typers too.  They also have an unusual motor mounted just under the keyboard that the OUTSIDE of the motor spins instead of the inside.  Wow!!!  IBM typebar machines, both standard and Executive, have a bit of snap to them where Selectrics are a little bouncier.  Smith-Coronas, since their inception into electrics, nothin' but bounce.  But the touch and the print are mostly superb.  This is not only their portables, but their upright electrics also.  Even Remington electrics have a very good touch.  But in their realm, they notoriously have machines that you punch a key, and about ten seconds later the type bar comes up.  The Hermes 808 typewriters I once dabbled in had a very Swiss feel to them.  It was ashame I couldn't understand quite how to repair them.  My Everest machines are a shade mushy, but they type very well.  They were about like two Adler manuals I once had, but after I got used to them, I did pretty well with them.  One of the lightest on its typebars was a late 1960s Remington upright.  It was almost like an electric typewriter.  The Noiseless typewriters--portable and upright, feel kind of incomplete--like you're typing "at" the paper and not hitting it all the way.  They also don't print very well--at least the ones I've used and owned.  That's about all I can remember.  Later on, I might return to this thread if I can think of three, maybe two more machines I've tried.  Who knows, maybe I try one I have never used tomorrow or something.

There´s another category I usually throw typewriters in: strong / weak.

This one is pretty much self explanatory. If the typewriter feels like it´s going to disintegrate as you type, then it´s weak. That can be applied to many plastic bodied models, mainly the ones designed only for ocassional use. Think of it as the difference between an Olympia Splendid 33 (definitely strong) and the horrid newer Mercedes-branded portables.
 

I've been typing on Hermes 3000s for some time, having selected them over the Olympia SM 3s, 4s, and 9s for something having to do with feel, and their incredible reliability.  I've recently given nice examples of the Olivetti Lettera 32, an Optima Elite 3, and an Alpina Senior a good workout as well, and find myself most happy with the Hermes 3000, of which I have four, a lifetime supply, I suspect.  I guess I'll put the others out for sale, and just be a Hermes guy.  I guess I would call the 3000 feel smooth, solid, cushioned, quiet, steady, fluid and neutral enough to not be a distraction, although that might just be my familiarity with the machine.  All the 3000 are clean and oiled, and only the French made, plastic bodied one feels different, kind of flaky and iffy, compared to the Swiss models.