[GreenKeys] 6 Bit? Linotype TTS?

[Philipp Hachtmann]

Hi David and everybody on the list,

Am 06.06.2013 06:20, schrieb dmm at lemur.com:
> Congratulations on your new Linotype!  I presume that this must
> be a German Linotype?  In America a Model 10 was a relatively early
> and quite unusual model built to a shorter overall height for
> shipboard use (yes, they had Linotypes on ships).  I presume that
> yours is probably a different machine.
It is a German one I think. And it's not a small one. It's in fact one of the 
biggest Linotype I have seen. I don't remember to have seen a bigger one yet. 
But I know that those exist.

Summary: Model 10aS with Lino-Mohr saw, Hydrocentric (electric), Linolift, 
Fairchild TTS reader, and central format automatic.
The 10a is a four magazine mixer.

I have taken some pictures of the machine yesterday. It's still in it's original 
location in a print shop. Someone took away most of the mats and magazines about 
10 years ago. Many additional bits and pieces are gone. But I think that I'll 
get everything together again. There's pure chaos around the machine. And it's 
completely powdered thanks to the printing gear around. But under the powder the 
machine seems to be in great (!) condition with no rust at all. I bought this 
machine on eBay because I wanted a Linotype for a long time and it's only one 
kilometre away from my factory. That's a big advantage over anything that is 
located anywhere else. Said all that, here are the pictures:

http://hachti.de/?bilder/linotype (The URL looks strange but is correct!)

> The Teletypesetter is indeed 6-level (one wouldn't really
> say "six bit" since the concept of the "bit" wasn't introduced
> until the 1940s, after the Teletypesetter).  The tape is 7/8 inch
> wide (not the 11/16 tape used by most 5-level Teletype equipment -
> though I am told that Kleinschmidt typing reperforators used
> 7/8 inch tape on 5-level service to allow room for the printing).
> It is not the 1-inch tape used by 8-bit equipment, either.
> I have also been told that the Flexowriter used 7/8 tape
> in 7-bit operation, but I have no experience with this.
>
Oh, oh! I have nearly 1000 rolls of 1 inch paper on stock. And many rolls of the 
5 bit paper. But I have not seen any single 7/8" roll yet. Finding that paper 
will be "fun".

> the TTS company was sold to Fairchild.  The primary market was
> newspaper work.
Haha, really Fairchild. The company that I know only for their semiconductors 
and ICs :-)

> I've scanned quite a bit of Teletypesetter literature.  Some of the
> sales literature is online at:
>
> <http://www.circuitousroot.com/artifice/letters/press/compline/literature/tts/sales/index.html>
Ah, cool. I'll check that out.
I got spare part lists and manuals for all options with my machine. But they're 
in German, of course...

> Finding TTS equipment is difficult, at least in the US.  It is much
> harder to locate than either Linotype or 5-level Teletype equipment.
> My theory is that the TTS systems went primarily into larger
> newspapers.  These newspapers scrapped their Linotypes wholesale
> when they switched to photocomposition in the late 1970s and the 1980s.
> The Linotypes which have survived have tended to be in smaller shops
> and in general "job" shops, and these tended not to have TTS equipment.
My Linotype came from a newspaper to a smaller print shop. But they don't have 
the punch (anymore?). I'm quite sorry about that.

> So if you find ANY 6-level equipment, grab it!
> You might also want to keep an eye out for BRPE punches (which could
> be configured for various numbers of punches); there were also
> some computer-driven punches capable of 6-level work.
> I'm sure there must have been other 6-level equipment in Europe
> that I'm completely unaware of.
Oh, I could get the one or other BRPE punch. Have not yet taken closer look to 
those.
As someone wrote in another posting, the sprocked holes are shifted a bit. I 
could verify that from one of the manuals I got. Don't know how that could work 
with an unmodified BRPE or other punch.

> There is one other alternative if your goal is simply to drive the
> Linotype.  Most of the Linotypes which are still in service under
> automatic control have been converted to computer input.  I don't know
> the details of this system (or systems), but I believe that it is
> basically 1980s vintage computer technology adapted (then) to
> replace the tape reader on the TTS units so that you could drive
> the Linotype from disk.  Dave Seat (who is rather well known in
> Linotype circles in America - he's the last travelling Linotype
> repairman in the country) knows this hardware well.
I already thought about that, too. I would build something that mechanically 
"emulates" the paper tape so that no modification to the machine is needed. 
Everything involving the destruction of the original gear is considered bad.

> If you're new to Linotypes, welcome!
Yes, I don't know the details of operation yet. I wanted to have one since I saw 
one of the last machines in service some 19 years ago when I was 15. One of the 
last in regular print shop service... My printing museum club here in Hannover 
(http://www.buchdruckmuseum-hannover.de) has a working model 5c two magazine 
mixer. But my new machine seems to be in better shape under the dust :-P

> They're endlessly fascinating.
Yes. And with the TTS system they close the gap between several of my interests: 
I've always been fascinated by anything print related. At the age of 20 I 
started to collect mechanical teleprinters. I really like them. Then the paper 
tape lead me to vintage computers. I was already studying computer science at 
that time. So I built up a fairly large (several truckloads of equipment) 
collection of vintage computing gear (Honeywell H316 and DDP-516, many PDP8 
machines, some PDP11 stuff, and much around that).
Three years ago I got into the situation to be able to get into printing. I 
bought a Heidelberg Windmill and hoarded many tons of lead type. Still dreaming 
of a Heidelberg Cylinder. And now the Linotype. If fittet with a PDP8/e driven 
typesetting adapter, I would have a machine that covers all those quite 
different fields of interest :-)


> If I can be of any assistance on the "hot metal" end of this,
> please do not hesitate to ask (again, noting that I'll be offline until
> June 15).
Ok, noted.

Kind regards

Philipp :-)