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Did not have a "Tuxedo" typewriter in my collection.
I knew about the Olivetti Studio 45...but the Underwood 450 was available in black & white colours. And it is really a Studio 45 with a new set of clothes.
First photo is of the machine coming my way. It was made in Spain.
The other photos are from the TWDB Galleries to show the Olivetti styling of the Underwood 450.
My machine is coming with its minty-conditioned case as well. Should be here for the weekend.
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Here in Italy we have not many Underwood 'Olivettis' , understandably. There are probably more model 5 still lugging around than model 450 (my '5' is a 1913 model, 111 years old and God knows how many revamps, and still working fine). So .. I think I never saw a 450 in the flesh. But honestly, this time the plain, unassuming Underwood is nicer-looking than the fashionable Sottsass/Von Klier 'Studio' sister. Never liked that much the Valentine and the Studio 45, despite the cult status of the former. But I find their computers and calculators and standards terrific! Olivetti Logos desktop calculators in particular are piece of art imho. The 450 looks every bit as sharp.
I think the cinematic of the 45/450 is close to that of the Lettera 35, thus still the older Lettera 32 ultra-portable made bulkier, and some plastic part starting to appear, like carriage knobs, lever tops and margin tags. Still great user machines: my father used his 35 for decades and I still have and use it.
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I have a favor t oask: it appears from the first picture your Underwood will have some 10cpi typeface. Now, as far as I know, Olivetti never made 'real' 10cpi machine, their '10' typeface should be 10 characters every 26mm instead. When I measured mine, it was 26 mm or at least they appeared so to my ruler. Difference is small. Typing 80 characters though, the resulting 4 mm difference should become apparent and measurable. I would be very grateful to understand if in your Underwood , 80 characters are 204-ish (thus real 10cpi) or more like 208 mm long (as Olivettis are said to be, I ignore if this is valid for all years , typefaces and models).
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Hi Duna,
Will do when I have the machine home and serviced.
Speaking of Olivetti adding machines. This one I kept for my collection :
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And this one I repaired/serviced and got working...but a family friend who does taxes for people during tax season wanted one for his home and business. I gave it to him as a gift.
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You will probably hate this, but I have broken two (totally unrepairable and rusty) Olivetti Summa Primas for parts in the last five years. They are an excellent source of springs, screws, nuts, knobs and feet for repairing typewriters - particularly Olivetti typewriters.
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Hi Tom,
I did similar with this Olympia adder. It had several broken plastic drive gears...so I decided to part it out and its wonderful case went to my Facit adder that was was missing its case.
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I like the black and white colour scheme of the 450. I'll be interested to see whether it is a true 10cpi or not as well.
Nice adding machines too!
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Hi Duna,
Got my Underwood 450 up-packaged this morning and measured.
80 Characters ===> 208 mm in length.
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My goodness me. That picture of the Facit adding machine brings back memories. They were also sometimes sold in the UK as ADDO, but with a deep yellow outer casing.