IBM Selectric Typewriter & its digital to analogue converter

Ғылым және технология

Using slow motion video Bill Hammack, the engineer guy, shows how
IBM's revolutionary "golf ball" typewriter works. He describes the
marvelous completely mechanical digital-to-analogue converter that
translates the discrete impulse of the keys to the rotation of the
type element. (This is the typewriter featured on the television series Mad Men.)

Пікірлер: 576

  • @markk3652
    @markk36524 жыл бұрын

    We had these in our typing class in high school in the 80's, the best prank was getting to class early, and while no one was around, lift the locking lever at the top of the ball. When class started, especially when there was a timed test, 20 or so selectrics launched their ball out of the machine!! Yeah, it was epic.

  • @alexradu1921

    @alexradu1921

    Жыл бұрын

    that must've been expensive if broke

  • @markk3652

    @markk3652

    Жыл бұрын

    @@alexradu1921 metal ball, carpeted typing lab. Still makes me laugh when I think about it!

  • @Liriq

    @Liriq

    Жыл бұрын

    Had me a good laugh. Thanks!

  • @choir74

    @choir74

    2 ай бұрын

    ​@@markk3652plastic ball with silver-coloured plating on top. I serviced them.

  • @th3unn3rv3d3
    @th3unn3rv3d39 жыл бұрын

    Amazing how violent it looked when it was slowed down.

  • @petrofilmeurope

    @petrofilmeurope

    6 жыл бұрын

    So violence is amazing?

  • @JonatasAdoM

    @JonatasAdoM

    6 жыл бұрын

    +Harald Jan Dahle Isn't it? We watch violence every day after way. If not amazing it is quite entertaining.

  • @VineFynn

    @VineFynn

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@petrofilmeurope wow you really got them didnt you

  • @xatryalaxamana

    @xatryalaxamana

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@VineFynn some people are so stupid they only took one word out of a sentence

  • @brianwest2775

    @brianwest2775

    2 жыл бұрын

    Another slow mo in the original very cool commercial: kzread.info/dash/bejne/qIKJp7etmJrXmsY.html "Commercial for IBM's Selectric Typewriter 1960's"

  • @jozefsk7456
    @jozefsk74569 жыл бұрын

    mind blown how people come up with this stuff

  • @user-nx7sd1yi7q

    @user-nx7sd1yi7q

    6 жыл бұрын

    every video i feel the same, i want to be an engineer and it has made me more insecure for sure

  • @ianblanchet5500

    @ianblanchet5500

    6 жыл бұрын

    134513 1435 Haha same my dude

  • @fnytnqsladcgqlefzcqxlzlcgj9220

    @fnytnqsladcgqlefzcqxlzlcgj9220

    2 жыл бұрын

    It was a different time, hundreds of times less distractions, more commitment, less arrogance, less ego. People worked harder, longer, smarter and for others, not for themselves. Check out "my dinner with Andre"

  • @agustinsida8877

    @agustinsida8877

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@fnytnqsladcgqlefzcqxlzlcgj9220 na man they were bored as fuck

  • @fnytnqsladcgqlefzcqxlzlcgj9220

    @fnytnqsladcgqlefzcqxlzlcgj9220

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@agustinsida8877 baka

  • @AdrianHereToHelp
    @AdrianHereToHelp Жыл бұрын

    The wiffletree is actually incredibly genius, wow. I would never have thought of such an elegant design.

  • @flurng
    @flurng6 жыл бұрын

    Many years ago, I used to repair IBM Selectrics, so I am quite familiar with their workings, and to this day, I am still astonished by their exquisite design - they are a MASTERPIECE of mechanical engineering!Yet, I would argue that these are not digital-to-analog, but binary-to-decimal converters, since their "whiffletrees" can generate only integer, or decimal, movements. You could not, for instance, have 1.643 or 2.165 increments of rotation, only 0, 1, 2 or 3 increments. (In the case of vertical "tilt")

  • @schievel6047

    @schievel6047

    4 жыл бұрын

    flurng while I understand your argument I think with that argument you could say, that even today there are no real binary to analog converters. When we convert binary to „analog“ we take discrete binary numbers an turn them into other discrete numbers. The resulting numbers are considered „analog“ when the gaps between them are small enough so we can just neglect them. In your example one could certainly build a decent mechanical device that converts digital numbers to 0.000, 0.001, 0.002 etc. and you would sooner or later reach 1.643 and also 2.145 with that. We would consider this output as analog, nevertheless its rather „pseudoanalog“. The gaps are just 0.001 sized instead of 1. Turns out there is no such device that could generate a real analog signal out of a discrete digital one. A D/A converter is in fact a function f that transforms a number into an other number. For a given (digital) input number we want only one possible result as output, everything else would result in nonsense. That means we want the f to be injective. Now since the input is discrete and finite (there is a maximum digital number that a computer can store) we can not use f to generate an continuous output set out of the input. Since the continuous output has an infinite amount of numbers between every two numbers of that set, we would simply run out of input numbers before we could „hit“ every possible output.

  • @sanjeen2503

    @sanjeen2503

    4 жыл бұрын

    @@schievel6047 interesting point. However, 'time' can be used to bring continuity in the output space. For example, an inverter working with a DC 12 Volt battery can give a close to sinusoidally varying output using clever 'circuit switching' electronics.

  • @torydavis10

    @torydavis10

    3 жыл бұрын

    Well, it turns out that reality is fundamentally discrete, not continuous, so really digital vs. analog is a question of the resolution of a system vs. the resolution of its measurement.

  • @stallio5612

    @stallio5612

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@schievel6047 how you discuss such an complex technical or niche topic with such a fluency...think we have a core techie in comment section....nice to see you people around.

  • @schievel6047

    @schievel6047

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@stallio5612 oh thank you very very much. I really appreciate your compliment because English is not my mother tongue and I am always worried when I try to discuss a math topic in English people only under nonsense 😅

  • @RemoVEVO
    @RemoVEVO4 жыл бұрын

    This blew my mind when we opened one in typing class. Looks way cooler than programming a keyboard. The mechanical precision of something so old is just way too fascinating.

  • @tiberiu_nicolae

    @tiberiu_nicolae

    Жыл бұрын

    "So old"

  • @earthling_parth
    @earthling_parth Жыл бұрын

    Wow, thank you Alec from Technology Connection's for bringing me here. Fascinating engineering indeed!

  • @samtibbitts
    @samtibbitts Жыл бұрын

    Hello again and greeting from a Technology Connections viewer

  • @johnyoung4747
    @johnyoung474710 жыл бұрын

    Thanks for the explanation. I always wondered how that mechanism worked. I was a reporter when Selectrics first came into our newsroom in the 1970s. We used an OCR ball and typed on special copy paper. Those were then fed into an OCR machine -- half the size of a refrigerator -- that produced a punched paper tape that was read by a Compugraphic typesetter -- the full size of a refrigerator. That spit out justified columns of type on photosensitive paper that had to be developed and pasted down and shot for a page negative that was used to burn an offset printing plate for the press. Quite the convoluted process. Then Macs came along. I always loved the IBM keyboard, so i was happy to find a Selectric II at a thrift store for $5 last year. After a cleaning and lubricating, it works fine. (It came out of our county courthouse so it was well-serviced -- there's a lot of junkers around.) A Yahoo group named golf ball typewriters is a great knowledge base to keep them running, and the ribbons and correction tape are still readily available.

  • @michaelc9217
    @michaelc92173 жыл бұрын

    I grew up watching my mom type on one of these. She was so good she could even create forms with it. Super straight lines and columns.

  • @JB-xg7io

    @JB-xg7io

    Жыл бұрын

    Yep me too. I can still hear the sound of my Mom chopping away on her Selectric back in the 70's.

  • @Primus.711
    @Primus.7118 жыл бұрын

    Cool! I was an instumentman in the Navy. I repaired the Selectric and the Selectric II on board my ship. You have no idea how many typewriters there were on an aircraft carrier back in the day.

  • @macguionbajo
    @macguionbajo2 жыл бұрын

    I got curious about this typewriter, searched for a couple of videos and was blessed with this amazingly concise and detailed explanation of it's inner workings. It's awesome this kind of content is free, what a time to be alive Thank you

  • @ChannelOfMarvin
    @ChannelOfMarvin8 жыл бұрын

    I enjoyed watching this! It brought back a sweet memory. In 1979 I bought an old IBM Selectric I/O typewriter, that had electromagnets connected to each branch of the wiffle tree. I was experimenting with a new type of keyboard, and built an interface so that my key switches would fire the right magnets to produce the character that matched the keys. My new keyboard design did not make me rich and famous as I had hoped, but it was tons of fun figuring out how it all worked - because when I bought it, I had imagined the inner workings very differently from how they really work.

  • @BryanTorok
    @BryanTorok Жыл бұрын

    Seeing how the ball is position is amazing and I was happy to see that. I'm amazed that after decades, the linkages and cables haven't been stretched or worn out and not longer position the ball correctly. But, I would like to see how the keys translate into the movement of the wiffletree.

  • @ianbutler9207

    @ianbutler9207

    Жыл бұрын

    The only cable in the selectric is the one that moves the carriage! Tilt and rotate are translated to the hall via thin metal tapes that go around pulleys out of frame, and what the video calls cables are in fact metal rods!

  • @gameworkerty
    @gameworkerty6 жыл бұрын

    My grandpa worked on designing that ball carriage system for IBM

  • @audilicous

    @audilicous

    4 жыл бұрын

    And yet your username has "chemtrail" in it... your family went off the deep end apparently.

  • @infinummjb

    @infinummjb

    4 жыл бұрын

    @@audilicous it's so myopic of you to interpret it like that - in fact it's clear from the guy's username and videos, that it's the opposite of what you wrote

  • @ChrisOReilly

    @ChrisOReilly

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@audilicous I think he's being sarcastic with the name, also, it isn't only dumb people fall for conspiracies, some people are smart, know they're smart and so, want to think differently to others (subconsciously) and so they are more likely to fall for things that are believable.

  • @artsmith103

    @artsmith103

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@ChrisOReilly Chemtrails are real. The conspiracy is trying to hide the truths about them.

  • @ChrisOReilly

    @ChrisOReilly

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@artsmith103 I have been in the cockpit of commercial jets a number of times and no switch causes "chemtrails", it's the stupidest idea I've ever heard.

  • @concorde2003
    @concorde200310 жыл бұрын

    My dad's cousin, Thurston Toeppen, designed a number of critical parts for the selectric and is named on many patents. In particular, he designed the latching mechanism that securely attaches the ball ("ocular") to the shaft.

  • @TheTheo58
    @TheTheo582 жыл бұрын

    How can no one like this video? Decades ago late 70's my mother was taking a business class, our dad rented/leased an IBM Selelctic-2 with the ball typeface for her to use at home. I remember those typewriters were very expensive over $1,200.00 or higher. I was able to use it, when mom was not working on it. It was an amazing machine. Some years later, I found one at a garage sale had some issue. Decided to get it repaired. Cost was under 150.00.

  • @Oddman1980
    @Oddman19807 жыл бұрын

    When he showed the two cables, it made me think: So many basic mechanisms are used in different things that have nothing to do with one another. The cables he showed in this typewriter work the same as the shifter cables in my car, which uses two cables to move three shift forks. The mechanism that you see in old style windshield wipers to distribute the load from one point evenly across the entire blade is also seen in hydraulic carton clamps that are attached to forklifts to carry appliances. The list of non-associated machines that use the same idea is endless and amazing. I love these videos, and can't wait to watch more.

  • @mookinbabysealfurmittens

    @mookinbabysealfurmittens

    Жыл бұрын

    Wow! Fantastic!

  • @weissblitz88
    @weissblitz882 жыл бұрын

    The IBM Selectric were awesome machines. My mother was a secretary and she loved them. And my father used to work for PanAm and I remember back in the 70s their reservation system terminals were these typewriters.

  • @dianamccandless7094
    @dianamccandless70948 жыл бұрын

    Whenever I watch your videos, I end up with MORE questions than I had before! (That's because I didn't know enough to have questions in the first place). Thanks for your videos!

  • @pluspiping
    @pluspiping Жыл бұрын

    Oh Nostalgia, my mom had one of these when I was a kid! When I was about 6 I was allowed to use it a bit, I'd goof off on it or write diaries, and I'd always puzzled at the "golfball". This solved that ancient childhood mystery for me. Thank you!

  • @salamurai
    @salamurai2 жыл бұрын

    My mother owned an IBM Selectric for the family business. the first few seconds of this video, that specific sound, took me all the way back to childhood in the late 70s/80s.

  • @Greenskycity
    @Greenskycity Жыл бұрын

    Cool! My grandfather, Horace smart Beattie invented the selectric for ibm. I’ve got the 1 millionth one sitting in my family room with a plaque on it and everything. Neat!

  • @MichaelHutton1

    @MichaelHutton1

    Жыл бұрын

    I was trained on Selectric repair and maintenance back in 1978. We were told that the inventors of the Selectric 1 went insane because the mechanism was so complex. Do you think that there is any truth to that rumor?

  • @Greenskycity

    @Greenskycity

    Жыл бұрын

    @@MichaelHutton1 lol, nope none at all. He retired as a vp in the 80s, had a horse farm and had very thought provoking questions for his grandchildren. Good man.

  • @MichaelHutton1

    @MichaelHutton1

    Жыл бұрын

    @@Greenskycity thanks. It’s nice to finally get such information even 44 years later.

  • @becauseimafan

    @becauseimafan

    Жыл бұрын

    That's so cool! ⌨️📝 Get it? Type write(r)! 😁

  • @coffeeisgood102
    @coffeeisgood1028 жыл бұрын

    I cried when that machine was introduced. It rendered my Underwood # 5 obsolete. Ah, progress!

  • @timhofstetter5654

    @timhofstetter5654

    2 жыл бұрын

    Your Underwood STILL ISN'T completely obsolete.

  • @hazelanderson1479

    @hazelanderson1479

    2 жыл бұрын

    Your Underwood #5 will still work even if there’s a power cut. The Selectric, however, will not. Progress?

  • @timhofstetter5654

    @timhofstetter5654

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@hazelanderson1479 Exactly. I wish I could upvote that comment about five times. 8)

  • @d1oftwins

    @d1oftwins

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@suprememasteroftheuniverse Not sure if using an ink ribbon more than once is worth the savings compared to the outcome. 😉

  • @53subscribersnovideos35

    @53subscribersnovideos35

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@hazelanderson1479 But who's going to type in the dark, anyway.

  • @kahvac
    @kahvac12 жыл бұрын

    I still remember my first Selectric. Nothing like it ever existed before. It was very advanced for it's time. Thanks for taking the time to explain this incredible machine !

  • @jimsmith77901
    @jimsmith77901 Жыл бұрын

    In 1980 I assisted my friend Todd as he converted a Selectric to be a printer. He also built the interface board. I didn't understand how the Selectric worked, but he made the entire process seem simple. Now, 42 years later, I understand the Selectric. Thanks for this!

  • @vincentrobinette1507
    @vincentrobinette15073 жыл бұрын

    I've always wanted to pull an IBM Selectric typewriter apart, to see how it was able to control the ball with each key stroke. I understood the "draw bands", but I didn't know the mechanism used to pull the draw bands the right amount, for the letters on the ball to strike the page perfectly. With this explanation, I can see that the system is clever, but simple enough to be reliable. I've NEVER had a problem with these typewriters, other than breaking a draw band. I did notice, that the draw bands were connected to shieves on levers, allowing the head to span margin to margin, with no errors in centering up the letter to strike perfectly. Great video!

  • @fergusof
    @fergusof5 жыл бұрын

    Ok, that was the intro ... where's the rest? Now I'm intrigued.

  • @timhofstetter5654

    @timhofstetter5654

    2 жыл бұрын

    Don't be. It was wrong anyway.

  • @Number_055

    @Number_055

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@timhofstetter5654 [citation needed]

  • @timhofstetter5654

    @timhofstetter5654

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Number_055 Mo citation actually necessary. There's nothing analog about the IBM Selectric; it's purely mechanical-digital (base 4 and base 22). The whole premise upon which this video was based was incorrect.

  • @darkwood777

    @darkwood777

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@timhofstetter5654 It uses discrete analog output. Mechanical levers by nature are analog.

  • @timhofstetter5654

    @timhofstetter5654

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@darkwood777 Neither of those statements even begins to be true. Mechanical levers with a finite number of orientations / positions are by nature digital. Your fingers are levers, and they are the prime origin of the term "digital". When you count on your fingers, they have two positions: up (1) and down (0). There is no "halfway" (~0.5) position. There is no one-third (1/3) position. There is nothing analog about your fingers when you're counting. Anything with a finite range of positions is digital. Analog is infinitely variable with or without optional limits.

  • @Pillowcase
    @Pillowcase7 жыл бұрын

    Amazing. I picked one up once at a thrift shop just to admire the way that it worked. One of the most impressive mechanical products I can think of.

  • @Allbbrz
    @Allbbrz3 жыл бұрын

    Oh boy... when I beginning my career as a developer in Brazil, these machines were absurdly expensive and of course, whenever one was available, there was always someone who wanted to interface it with and print from the computer... what a fun times were those.

  • @TrueStoreyPB
    @TrueStoreyPB Жыл бұрын

    Extremely concise. Could have heard way more about this machine I think.

  • @davidstrohl
    @davidstrohl Жыл бұрын

    Thanks for the video. I’ve used Selectrics for years and never actually was curious how they worked. It’s all so simple now.

  • @iamalongusername
    @iamalongusername Жыл бұрын

    This video is about to get a lot more popular.

  • @engineerguyvideo

    @engineerguyvideo

    Жыл бұрын

    Why?

  • @ayeebert

    @ayeebert

    Жыл бұрын

    We were sent from a typographically smooth youtuber named Alec from Technology Connections.

  • @richardrosenthal7241
    @richardrosenthal72413 жыл бұрын

    Great description of the working of the Selectric I spent 20 years working on Selectric and you do the best at demystifying the machine

  • @Sillimant_
    @Sillimant_ Жыл бұрын

    I love these are under creative commons, bill explains things in such a simple and intuitive way

  • @LD-Orbs

    @LD-Orbs

    Жыл бұрын

    Also used in the "Selectric" article on English Wikipedia.

  • @2GFactFinder
    @2GFactFinder5 жыл бұрын

    Man you are amazing - Thanks for the explanation of an accurate mechanism designed by our senior tech genius.

  • @fabricancustoms
    @fabricancustoms12 жыл бұрын

    I would've liked to know more about the other components of the typewriter, but this is incredible!

  • @gskaplan
    @gskaplan13 жыл бұрын

    This is such a GREAT video. I am also a Selectric fan and have the service manuals that describe this. I remember first reading this section and thinking how brilliant the design was. I am a collector of IBM Composers, a machine based on the Selectric.

  • @rickbiessman6084
    @rickbiessman6084 Жыл бұрын

    I’m just barely old enough to have used a typewriter as a kid. I had no idea something like this existed until now. What an absolutely amazing design! The mechanical precision blows my mind. Seems a lot more elegant to me than throwing tons of modern computing power at a problem.

  • @saa82vik
    @saa82vik8 жыл бұрын

    Now we are waiting the video explaining how to link a computer to a selectric ... ;)

  • @Fopenplop

    @Fopenplop

    6 жыл бұрын

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Selectric_typewriter#Use_as_a_computer_terminal

  • @matthewlitvak2695

    @matthewlitvak2695

    3 жыл бұрын

    saa82vik It existed in 71 or 72, it consisted of 5x8” magnetic card that was inserted into a writer/reader. I can’t recall if the Selectric itself was able to store part of the document until it was transcribed on to the magnetic card.

  • @scottwelch1148

    @scottwelch1148

    3 жыл бұрын

    I built one, in 1983. It hooked up to an Apple ][ using a parallel (8 bit) output card. The challenge was writing the driver in 255 bytes.

  • @ErikBruchez

    @ErikBruchez

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@matthewlitvak2695 You are referring to one of the Mag Card machines (there was an original Mag Card, and then a Mag Card II), based on the same system of reed relays and solenoids. But IBM also had computer terminals based on the Selectric. The Mag Card had a separate console handling all the electronics but was not connected to a computer. The IBM Memory Typewriter put the entire system within an enclosure just a little larger than a regular Selectric.

  • @matthewlitvak2695

    @matthewlitvak2695

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@ErikBruchez I’ve got a very vague memory of the entire system, I was 10 or 11 when it came out in 72. It was initially kept in the file room at my dads law firm in Chicago. I remember the card holder and the reader, I just can’t remember how it operated and whether you could edit a stored document.

  • @woogiewoogie0012
    @woogiewoogie0012 Жыл бұрын

    Hello from Technology Connections!

  • @krisdphillips
    @krisdphillips Жыл бұрын

    I'd already seen this video years ago, but Technology Connections sent me here with his typerwriter video.

  • @ericlawrence9060
    @ericlawrence90605 жыл бұрын

    I really love the videos i've seen so far. You are an excellent presenter.

  • @andrascsirmaz3043
    @andrascsirmaz3043 Жыл бұрын

    Technology Connections brought me here and now I'm a subscriber. :)

  • @garrswenson
    @garrswenson2 жыл бұрын

    This channel is the OG of engineering explained genre. Just when I thought I had binge watched all his videos, I find a new topic I somehow missed.

  • @Specialtyledsledjbooth
    @Specialtyledsledjbooth13 жыл бұрын

    @engineerguyvideo Fascinating! Hard to believe that this thing even works, and works as well as it does! One thing that has ALWAYS fascinated me is how we design and machine these small parts and devices to the exact level of precision necessary for these devices to work - repeatedly. Have you ever considered making a "measurements" engineering video? I would it! I know today that smaller measurements are made possible by using lasers and sensors, but what were the standards for back then?

  • @HiAdrian
    @HiAdrian11 жыл бұрын

    That's so nifty! No wonder some people get nostalgic about old hardware.

  • @ClickLikeAndSubscribe
    @ClickLikeAndSubscribe Жыл бұрын

    Clear and succinct explanation of amazing technology!

  • @lygiamariamourafernandes2958
    @lygiamariamourafernandes29583 жыл бұрын

    I was a secretary back then and had a wonderful red Selectric. It was beautiful to look at and great to work with. It brings me good memories.

  • @mookinbabysealfurmittens
    @mookinbabysealfurmittens Жыл бұрын

    Technology Connections sent me. Great video! Cheers!

  • @MrPedrofoto
    @MrPedrofoto8 жыл бұрын

    Another terrific video showing the sheer ingenuity of people. I love the engineering of typewriters and still use an old Olivetti Studio 44 typewriter. It's min mint condition. :D

  • @nicomedesmadriz
    @nicomedesmadriz2 жыл бұрын

    My father . .who rest in peace, he was a Lawyer so he used to have all kinds of typing machines this one's was like the latest of all.

  • @saablazer1658
    @saablazer1658 Жыл бұрын

    Technology Connections sent me here. Great video!

  • @loveisall5520
    @loveisall5520 Жыл бұрын

    As a guy who started typing in the sixties, I remember my 7th grade science teacher in 1967 had her own Selectric in the classroom, a wide-carriage green one. Of course, none of us were ever allowed to type on it but I can remember being mesmerized watching her type up mimeo masters, etc., on it at times. Even the school's secretary only had a regular Model C. I was a pro typist through a decade of college, all of it being on Selectric-based word processors (MT/ST, MC I, MC II). I still own two of these (Correcting Selectric and Personal Selectric) and love them.

  • @gogopossum
    @gogopossum Жыл бұрын

    Thanks to the Stuff You Should Know podcast with Josh and Chuck fir sending me here. New subscriber!

  • @fahb68
    @fahb682 жыл бұрын

    10 years later still been a good video

  • @vk2zay
    @vk2zay13 жыл бұрын

    I have always wondered how golfball printers worked. That is far more wonderful than I had imagined. Very ingenious mechanism!

  • @winniepeg9869
    @winniepeg9869 Жыл бұрын

    Very interesting. We had these at work. Called them golf ball machines. Ingenious. I moved up to a data processing machine, a magnetic card machine, which was very similar but with a huge floor standing memory with very thick connecting cable. I was the only one in the UK government department at the time. No need to retype reports as the magnetic card held all the typing in its memory so just had to stop the machine and correct the reports. Brilliant at the time. I’ve never seen nor heard of them since.

  • @pirincri
    @pirincri Жыл бұрын

    Technology Connections channel led me here. Stating it for marketing purposes.

  • @gdmt
    @gdmt2 жыл бұрын

    Im still amazed this was created back in that era. This thing is way ahead of its time.

  • @Thegamer-ey9py
    @Thegamer-ey9py4 жыл бұрын

    Wow, I always wondered how this typewriter worked, thank you engineer guy!

  • @hashdfw
    @hashdfw11 жыл бұрын

    One of the earliest "electronic" typewrites was made by IBM based on the selectric. They basically used the Selectric with a similar mechanical mechanism on the keyboard to encode the keystroke which went into 7 or 8 on/off switches. The encoding went into their electronics. Then their electronics fired solenoids that where connected to the levers that do the tilt and rotate. Basically the computer was shimmed onto the control rods.

  • @EIGYRO
    @EIGYRO2 жыл бұрын

    Brilliant and accurate description. I couldn't have done it better myself, and I spent 5 years fixing these things. Great fun.

  • @anonharingenamn
    @anonharingenamn9 жыл бұрын

    Oh no! I wanted to see more slow-motion footage of it in use! What a crazy machine!

  • @zebfeldman
    @zebfeldman13 жыл бұрын

    The complexity of the selectric is truly remarkable as is how few folks understand or understood the elegance of the design. Thank you Bill for explaining how the type element works as well as the analog to digital component. Perhaps you can discuss how the correcting mechanism worked on the old models prior to correction tape.

  • @phorth
    @phorth9 жыл бұрын

    Thank you for introducing me to the Selectric and the Whiffletree

  • @kevinbarry71
    @kevinbarry71 Жыл бұрын

    I learned to type when I was about 10 years old. Shortly afterwards I saw one of these and I was fascinated and I wanted one. I still am, and do, 40 years later

  • @jennettesaxberg6528
    @jennettesaxberg65282 жыл бұрын

    That takes me back. They were state of the art when i learned to type.

  • @ddreger2
    @ddreger210 ай бұрын

    My mom did exactly what's mentioned toward the end of the video by combining a Selectric with a Zenith Z-89 computer. That crisp sound of the ball spinning and striking the page is an indelible memory, particularly since Mom's near first of its kind frankenprinter typed entire pages in a single run. Using that and WordStar I would produce perfectly "typed" book reports. My eighth-grade teachers wondered if I had a secretary.

  • @michaelallread9766
    @michaelallread97664 жыл бұрын

    These videos are absolutely incredible

  • @sarahconner9433
    @sarahconner94332 жыл бұрын

    Forget the dac .. The speed!! The speed!!! And accuracy!!!! A miracle!!

  • @podcastwookie
    @podcastwookie10 жыл бұрын

    Fabulous - very nicely explained and beautifully filmed. Thanks for this.

  • @Alex_dlc
    @Alex_dlc Жыл бұрын

    I miss this channel so much!

  • @alexpower9423
    @alexpower94237 жыл бұрын

    Love the zoom-ins. Great style, suits the presenter / content!

  • @harshwant
    @harshwant8 жыл бұрын

    Great work bill ! I thoroughly enjoy all your videos

  • @GroovesAndLands
    @GroovesAndLands3 жыл бұрын

    Born in 1980, I grew up around these. At 8-10 years old, I can recall being absolutely amazed by the mechanical marvel of the IBM Selectric. Whereas the traditional typewriter (a finely crafted instrument in its own right) had a simple enough design for a 9 year old to comprehend, the Selectric seemed like straight up wizardry to me. Yeah, I grew up to be a mechanical engineer...

  • @Liana8310
    @Liana83107 жыл бұрын

    That is so amazing. I own two typewriters and know how they work. I've seen a Selectric as well but never saw it in action. Cheers!

  • @tattootempest
    @tattootempest8 ай бұрын

    Hello from channel Technology Connections :) He recommended and linked your video as a much more in depth explantion on how this works then what he could do for his video :)

  • @gabrielpwv
    @gabrielpwv8 жыл бұрын

    Great video Bill. Big fan of your channel!

  • @jasonwalding9402
    @jasonwalding94022 жыл бұрын

    My sister typed so fast that a selctric began to type garbage. They bought one for her that had memory in between her key strokes and output. When she would stop typing, it would output for about ten to twelve seconds. She was some kinda fast.

  • @miranda9691

    @miranda9691

    2 жыл бұрын

    That was Fun to imagine

  • @dennisweifenbach2647

    @dennisweifenbach2647

    2 жыл бұрын

    That was only because the selectric was out of adjustment.

  • @Str4ngerr

    @Str4ngerr

    2 жыл бұрын

    I remember being a kid in the early 90s and trying to type really fast on a Brother electric typewriter, to my astonishment it had some kind of buffer so it behaved exactly like that, when I overrun the mechanism it would continue typing as I stopped my key strokes. I remember taking it apart just to have a look, it was rocket science for me haha

  • @makismakiavelis5718

    @makismakiavelis5718

    2 жыл бұрын

    Wow

  • @ryanokeefe12

    @ryanokeefe12

    2 жыл бұрын

    Considering this thing can type 14.8 characters per second, and the average amount of letters in a word is 6.7(lets say 7 for caution); to get a result of 10 additional seconds of typing once stopped, she would need to type at 127 words per minute PLUS an additional 21 words per minute for a whole minute to result in 10 seconds of continued letter input. This is 148 words per minute which hard to believe.

  • @y11971alex
    @y11971alex7 жыл бұрын

    This is a machine that never ceases to amaze. Other than routine maintenance, I'd say it's as reliable as a modern day word processing application.

  • @thepurrfectcat
    @thepurrfectcat2 жыл бұрын

    Wish you could show us the rotation as well... Great content. Very few videos on KZread today have such a great content.

  • @stanleysandeep
    @stanleysandeep Жыл бұрын

    Watching this after I saw it in the episode "Now you see him" of Columbo. Amazing machine and I truly believe the people from those era were geniuses. I'm from India and I have used typewriters. But, they all used separate pins for individual letters and I can see why this design is far superior...

  • @FalconFour
    @FalconFour2 жыл бұрын

    Fascinated by how this works, and trying to dive into more deep detail on how it was accomplished. This video just scratches the surface, though. How's it look like in the machine, in operation? How's the keyboard interface with those levers? Ahh! I just have more questions now after watching, and my search continues. Still, a good start.

  • @chinarut

    @chinarut

    Жыл бұрын

    yeah! I want to learn more about how this level of accuracy is sustained I'm sure after a minimum of a crazy number of keystrokes expected in its lifetime!

  • @dragonheadthing
    @dragonheadthing13 жыл бұрын

    Neat video! I have wondered for years how the ball kind of typewriters work.

  • @ktypewriter
    @ktypewriter3 жыл бұрын

    I am repairing an IBM Selcetric ball typewriter in Korea, but Ball's dynamic motion feels like an array of planets in outer space, I recommend that the IBM Ball Typewriter is one of the greatest masterpieces on earth.

  • @vincentbarkley9121
    @vincentbarkley91216 жыл бұрын

    There was a product sold that was a computer interface to a Selectric. It was actually a solenoid keyboard that attached over the Selectric's keyboard to press the keys. We had one of those attached to a Tandy TRS-80 (trash-80) computer. Thanks for the video.

  • @SilentDecode
    @SilentDecode Жыл бұрын

    I came here today just after the video of Technology Connections about the typewriter, release on the second of August 2022.

  • @LD-Orbs

    @LD-Orbs

    Жыл бұрын

    August 6th for me! 📆

  • @1944GPW
    @1944GPW13 жыл бұрын

    Just follewed through to this from an article on Hackaday. It brought back memories of our Selectric back in the 70s, and what an incredible piece of engineering it was. My dad worked for IBM and we also had a scrapped Selectric I/O Writer which had a bunch of tilt/rotate solenoids underneath the main Selectric chassis. We had intended to get it working with our 'home microcomputer' back in 1979 (a Fairchild F-8 3850 kit) but never did get far with the interface logic unfortunately.

  • @Apple_Beshy

    @Apple_Beshy

    11 ай бұрын

    You still here?

  • @rayoflight62
    @rayoflight6210 ай бұрын

    I used the Italian Olivetti version, the Lexicon gold ball typewriter, which was very similar. But I didn't liked the constant humming of the motor, so I kept using the traditional typewriter until the day I bought an 8088 PC with a 9 pin impact printer, later replaced with a Panasonic 24 pin. In total, more than 15 years on a typewriter - the first day with WordStar was like the first day of spring. Decades later, I've a lot of nostalgia for typewriters, and books growing one page per day...

  • @Ray-mr3gq
    @Ray-mr3gq Жыл бұрын

    Wow, I love being a mechanical engineer. This stuff is what I fell in love with.

  • @cyclenut
    @cyclenut5 жыл бұрын

    In high school I used an IBM Selectric Typewriter. Now I know hot it works. Very cool.

  • @SohomBhattacharjee
    @SohomBhattacharjee2 жыл бұрын

    This was more cool than I anticipated.

  • @tomwakemsr.4942
    @tomwakemsr.49422 жыл бұрын

    My uncle worked for IBM in Office Products in Boston. He kept us in typewriters in the 70's. One day he came and swapped out our Selectric II for a similar product but this one came with its own desk and a console to sit next to it. But sitting on/in the desk was a mostly normal looking Selectric. But this was no normal Selectric. This was an MT/ST which stood for Magnetic Tape/Selectric Typewriter. This rig could read and write to 1" Magnetic tape drive that resided in the console! This was a word processor! You could store a document code at the start of your document and later search a tape for that code to find your document then insert a new piece of paper and press PLAY. This is when you could witness the Selectric operating in its glory laying down characters at maximum speed and maximum decibels! The console was something of a marvel also as it was invented prior to integrated circuits. It had a huge array of relays and a row of printed circuit boards with transistors, resistors, capacitors and such. Inside the top of the console was the dual 1" tape drives. This was classic IBM mechanicals with heavy gears, clutches, cams and motors. At 8-10 years old I loved watching the read/write head moving back and forth across the tape and the mechanism advance the tape character at a time as I typed. Backspace moved the tape back one character. Later I went to work at IBM in service and the old timers didn't quite know what to make of all my experiences with 1960's and 70's hardware when I was 28. My uncle continued my education through the intro of the IBM PC. I learned to setup , configure, upgrade and diagnose those machines when I was 12. I credit the MT/ST and my uncle with the development of my technical mind.

  • @massacreman3000
    @massacreman300012 жыл бұрын

    This kind of things makes me wonder about all amazing things of yesteryear. Even mechanical typewriters are awesome to watch in action.

  • @jeffbaloga4376
    @jeffbaloga43766 жыл бұрын

    Love this stuff!!! Keep up the good work Bill!!

  • @cyanidesan
    @cyanidesan13 жыл бұрын

    you guys are really awesome.. just a few months ago i learned about the khanacademy videos and now i can watch all this for free too! thanks for keeping knowledge free. i learn more from the internet everyday that i ever did when i was in school!

  • @DrRyanHooker
    @DrRyanHooker2 жыл бұрын

    Thank god man. I was looking for how that damn ball got it's ink and the IBM commercial and another video didn't make it clear. Soon as I saw this channel I was much less aggravated.

  • @skoggiehoggins1445
    @skoggiehoggins14453 жыл бұрын

    wow, super awesome the way you broke this down.

  • @SpooderW
    @SpooderW13 жыл бұрын

    Fantastic as usual!

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