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Topic: A Pedal Steel out of Meccano? |
Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 20 Feb 2020 5:17 pm |
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| Has anyone ever built a pedal mechanism out of Meccano? |
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b0b
From:
Cloverdale, CA, USA
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Posted 20 Feb 2020 10:50 pm Re: A Pedal Steel out of Meccano?
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| Alan Brookes wrote: |
| Has anyone ever built a pedal mechanism out of Meccano? |
Sounds like something Alan Brookes would do. 
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Ian Rae
From:
Redditch, England
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Posted 20 Feb 2020 11:17 pm
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A colleague of my father's built a computer from Meccano.
That was in 1941 at a radar research facility. He left it running while he took weekend leave and left instructions to lubricate it regularly with Brasso.
Meanwhile my father's task was to miniaturise a radar setup that occupied a hangar so that it would fit in a Wellington bomber. Now the same frequency gear goes into a wristwatch.
What was the question again?
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richard burton
From:
Britain
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Posted 21 Feb 2020 3:45 am
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Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 21 Feb 2020 9:43 am
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How does it sound, Richard?
Do you have photos of the underneath? |
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Alan Bidmade
From:
Newcastle upon Tyne UK
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Posted 21 Feb 2020 9:50 am
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BRILLIANT!
(I wonder if Meccano ever reached the US shores?)
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Roger Rettig
From:
Naples, FL
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Posted 21 Feb 2020 10:20 am
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What was the US equivalent? Erector Set? I always felt that Meccano had the edge because of its colourful look. My brother and I would receive a set for Christmas - you started with Set #1 then adding #1A would convert it to a #2 Set. These basic outfits might enable the construction of a tiny wheelbarrow but it was enough to get you excited for the following Christmas!
I ended up with a #6 Set but the much-coveted #10 set - contained in a wooden cabinet with multiple drawers - cost around £40 in 1958 and was far beyond the means of any average household.
Happy days! Here's the image that adorned the early boxes - proud dad watches as an enormous blocksetting crane is constructed from the tiny #3 set (an impossible undertaking, by the way!)
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Dave Mudgett
From:
Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee
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Posted 21 Feb 2020 11:05 am
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Erector Set was indeed an independently-produced US kit similar to Meccano, produced by the A.C. Gilbert Company in New Haven, CT. Gilbert was a big deal in New Haven, and were involved with a bunch of "thinking kids" toy manufacturing, including American Flyer model trains, chemistry sets, telescopes & microscopes, and so on, as well as appliances. I believe they also ran the American Meccano company for a period. I lived very close to the Eli Whitney Museum in Hamden, CT just outside New Haven while in grad school - they have a collection of Gilbert stuff there.
I grew up with everything A.C. Gilbert - Erector sets, chemistry sets, trains, a reflector telescope, you name it. I have no doubt that all this was a strong influence on my ultimate decision to go into science and engineering. If people want more women to go into science, I say put an Erector set and similar toys into their hands at a young age and encourage them to explore.
One could build an incredibly wide range of things out of Meccano/Erector set materials if you could afford a big kit and the specialized mechanical parts necessary. As Roger states, this stuff could get pretty expensive - I had a pretty big kit and it took multiple birthday/xmas presents plus a lot of chores allowance months to pay for it.
On building a pedal steel - yeah, the picture states 1000 words. The girders were pretty strong but I'm not so sure about how they would hold up under 120-150 pounds of string tension for even 6 strings. But building mechanical stuff with a bunch of moving parts at a young age is IMO the best way to learn how things mechanical work. |
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richard burton
From:
Britain
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Posted 22 Feb 2020 12:31 am
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Despite being a Meccano kid, I did not build the Meccano pedal steel, it's a picture that was posted many years ago on the forum, which I added to my psg library
There are a few bits and pieces of Meccano on my Emmons push-pull, it's handy stuff  |
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Per Berner
From:
Skovde, Sweden
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Posted 22 Feb 2020 2:00 am
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| This thread brings back great memories of childhood days building diggers, cranes, locomotives and bulldozers. I would guess the Meccano pieces are way too soft and thin to produce a working pedal steel that would stay in tune. Cabinet drop would probably be measured in whole notes, not cents. But, on the other hand, James May (of Top Gear and The Grand Tour fame) proved that it is possible to build a motorbike and a bridge from the perforated stuff – a bit dysfunctional, but still... |
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Jim Pitman
From:
Waterbury Ctr. VT 05677 USA
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Posted 22 Feb 2020 4:42 am
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It's unfortunate that erector sets, tinker toys, lawn jarts, etc got relegated to the "dangerous toy museum".
The only thing I have left of my erector set is a cool AC electric motor with gear train.
Come to think of it I got a shock off that thing. I survived. My mom and dad did not litigate. |
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Paddy Long
From:
Christchurch, New Zealand
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Posted 23 Feb 2020 6:00 pm
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I always thought GFI's looked like they were made from Mecanno !!! :-}
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