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Saturday 14 March 2015

Getting There: Restoring a 1922 Remington 12 Standard Typewriter - Day One

This is one of eight typewriters given to me in the past two days. The gift was one of three machines which came from Wagga Wagga ("the place of many crows"). It's a late 1922 Remington 12 standard (serial number LA23481) which has obviously seen much better days. OK, a Remington 12 is not that much to crow about, but it doesn't deserve to look this shabby. Not when it can be restored to full working condition, and made to look splendid. It will just take a few days. 
First thing to do was remove the Gorin Billing and Tabulating Attachment. I'm not interested in billing or tabulation systems, I would never use them, the Gorin attachment was in by far the worst state of anything on the typewriter, and it was going to make my restoration job far, far more difficult if I left in on. So off it came.
In about an hour's work today I stripped off everything else I will remove before starting on dealing with the rust and repairing the paintwork. That's tomorrow's task. So far so good. Day three will probably involve reassembly and repairing the drawband - and some typing. Then I'll be crowing! 
DAY ONE
BEFORE
AFTER STEP ONE
AFTER STEP TWO

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, that's a challenge, alright, Robert. I can already feel the inspiration!
== Michael Höhne

Bill M said...

That restoration looks like quite a challenge. Then by step 2 I can already see you are headed to success.

Richard P said...

Eight typewriters in two days! Oh, what fun awaits you (and us).

Anonymous said...

Best of luck. I know you'll do fine.

I think I saw one of these for sale at a thrift store near my parents' house. It was called the Remington Special and was made in NY.

Don Lampert said...

A few weeks ago I got my first Remington 12, that was in poor, but not this poor a shape. Serial # LL 71599 from March, 1927.
Even though the right third of the type basket was rusted solid, I did slowly get it to free up, and now works like a charm.
I like my 12 much better than I imagined - it is a fine, if unexciting, and well built unit. Good luck Robert, am anxious to see your daily progress.

Don Lampert said...

I've never seen this, but mine has a left handed carriage return lever with a linkage across the front to the right side. Then it hooks into what would be the right hand carriage return lever linkage! Ever heard of that?

TonysVision said...

I agree with Michael - this is very inspiring, Robert, and hopefully will encourage some of us (including myself) not to just throw up our hands and turn similar cases into planters.

Slipe said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Slipe said...

Hi,

I am trying to restore a rusted typewriter Remington 12 and I was wondering if I could exchange some photos with you and ask your help on how to do a proper restore.

Can you please send me your email?

Regards,
Carlos from Portugal