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Here's a recent acquisition, an extremely filthy Monarch Visible that had been kept in a shed since the 1960s.
I bought it on eBay for £10 together with an equally dirty Imperial 55.
Nothing is missing that I can see and the carriage runs well, though the keys obviously jam and the platen is fissured. The paintwork is not bad at all.
I'm now summoning up the courage to strip it down and attempt to clean it up.
Last edited by Stevetype33 (29-3-2013 14:29:50)
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That is going to be a fun cleanup for you Steve.
Mine came pretty clean already. Those Monarchs are pretty typewriters. For comparison to yours:
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Ooooh that's a humdinger! That pinstriping is just sexy...
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I find it hard to find the earlier typewriters that still have good pin striping and I love pinstriping. L.C. Smiths always seem to have been used to death. I've seen a number of these Monarch Visibles with good striping as well as more Fox typewriters than with some makes.
Does your Monarch have the nice nickeled serial number boss as on mine? What is the ser. #?
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Visible is such an appropriate name for that machine. I could spend a day just staring into its guts. The serial number plate is a fantastic touch, and I like the little plates that cover the ribbons, but how does it type?
@Steve33: What are you going to do with that platen?
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It's a beautiful machine. This here, is why I love these older typewriters. They have a visual appeal that is just lost in later models, or indeed, in computers.
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Uwe wrote:
... but how does it type?
@Steve33: What are you going to do with that platen?
Is it supposed to type? I was thinking it was more something to look at since I can type on my computer.
Really, though, the feed rollers seem to be frozen in the released position and I am unable to feed paper into the platen. The keys type well but no ribbon. I have a feeling that the Monarch will require a fair amount of work to be a usable typewriter. Someone told me that the Monarch Visibles are not, in their opinion, good typers. But they are pretty...
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Dedication and courage, old boy.
The first thing is to give the machine a jolly good clean. Pick and scrape and scour out all the gunk, dust, lint, dead bugs and everything else. Then, flush the insides with generous doses of methylated spirits. Then work on oiling the machine thoroughly and testing it regularly. Once it's moving and working, you can concentrate on the fine-tuning.
Something this beautiful deserves to be restored.
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Steve Stephens: It has a serial number plate like yours: 105373.
I was also attracted by the good paintwork, though looking at yours I now notice the the lettering on the front bottom bar (is that a name for that?) is pretty much worn off. Odd I didn't see that before.
Elsewhere the decorative work is in good order and all the pin-striping is intact. There is some crinkling of the surface however. I read somewhere that this is caused by the varnish shrinking and not the paintwork itself. Not sure if there's a cure. If nothing else suggests itself I might try removing the varnish with cellulose thinners, but won't risk that just yet.
My plans is to gradually disassemble the whole thing, taking photos at every step and labeling each part so I know where it fits (I now have a huge stock of sticky labels in place).
Uwe: Like you, one of the attractions for me is the exposed inner workings. They look superb when they’re cleaned up.
Not sure what I’m going to do with the platen, though it turns nicely. Short of having it recovered, perhaps I could try and fill the cracks with something...
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Let's resurrect this thread. Last year a friend notified me that he had found a cover and base for a Monarch and, knowing that I had the No.2 shown in this thread, he offered the cover to me. I love to have the metal covers for the old standard typewriters but they are not always easy to find. I noted that the decal on the front of the case has an image of a No.1 Monarch but was wondering if that decal was used on the No.2 machines also.