Picture post

Gratuitous sculling photo from this evening's stroll by the river.

Finally got around to posting the SM4's mug-shot to the "Etc..." gallery. 

Daylight and tinfoil instead of the usual pair of Anglepoises.

All work and no play

After a week's neglect, I revisited the misaligned lowercase on my Olympia SM4 with the same hopes I might harbour returning to a baffling crossword clue. 

The upper and lower stops for the carriage's vertical travel (see earlier post) were so hard to reach, I decided that their adjustment shouldn't be the solution to fixing the unusefully large amount of play problem on an otherwise pristine Olympus. 

There were two sources of to-and-fro play in the carriage that I could see. One being the (unfathomable) shifting linkage, the other the bearings and the tracks the ball-races run along. I unclipped the carriage strap and spent a few minutes running it from side to side to see how the play might be eliminated. I'd assumed the two rails were part of the same pressing but when I got my magnifying glass out I could see that the rails were separately mounted and that the rail on the keyboard side showed a tell-tail knurled surface beneath one of the screws. An adjustment slot? Could be. After slackening the screws at both ends of the rail, I pushed each rail away from the other as far seemed practicable. I'd guess somewhere between 0.5mm and 1mm. Then I retightened the screws, adjusted the back rail stops (at bottom, see photo) and checked that the carriage still ran freely under ts own weight. It did and it worked! A few lines of type showed legible descenders on the lowercase where previously they'd been faint ghosts. The seven eighths is joy to behold!

Both photos taken under a desk light, typing not scanned. PS: The slow bike ride happened - I lost - and I didn't suffer the indignity of the knobbly knees competition.

So, if you find yourself with misaligned lowercase on an SM4 - maybe the above will help. I hope so. And thanks again to Robert and Mike for their helpful suggestions. Sometimes it is good to walk in the wrong direction before arriving at the destination.

Olympia SM4-still not right

Robert Messenger (hi Robert, thank you) pointed me towards an adjustment screw below and in front of the r/h capstan and advised checking that there was nothing fouling the carriage slides, possibly the carriage lock.

Apart from the lower and upper carriage-shift limiting screws (see photos) on each side of the machine - which are in more or less the place indicated by Robert, I can't see any other means of adjustment.  I have checked, and there's no obstruction on the carriage rails and the lock appears to work perfectly.

Compensating for the small amount of play that the carriage has on its rails does overcome the problem of misaligned lowercase type - but I can only achieve this by physically holding the carriage towards me as I type with my free hand. I don't think the machine has had particularly heavy use, so I guess that the amount of free play of the carriage on its rails is normal. 

I can see the bottom shift adjust screw (second photo) but can only get a too-thin screwdriver to it - with obvious results! I'll buy a better-fitting screwdriver and try that tomorrow - but there's still no way to back-off or re-tighten the lock-nut afterward - apart from pretty extensive (for me) disassembly. Just to get the bodywork off means removing the carriage - and no platen would mean I couldn't adjust the bottom stop of the carriage by trial and error typing.

Again, any help or advice gratefully received. Thanks in advance!

Arrowed: top limit adjustment screw

Arrowed: bottom limit adjustment screw (not in as great shape as it was)