Monday, August 8, 2022

Monday Mystery, wooden gears


This old mechanism could be a mix of commercially made wooden gears and various other bits arranged into some sort of specific device. Some of the gears do have some text printed on them, "Branch, Tor. Co." but nothing definitive. My guess might be some sort of homemade machine for some aspect of weaving, but any guesses?
 The gears are made of soft white wood with little grain structure, possibly basswood or poplar? I wouldn't expect it would be the best material for gears.






5 comments:

rats said...

Looks like the gears were cut from a discarded box, don't it? And the printing identified what was in that box.

Mister G said...

That's what I thought too. But you wouldn't think a guy who could make gears like that would be using salvaged material.

Anonymous said...

Maybe the printing was on the original sheet material. Could have been part of a toy?

rdguy

Dave said...

My WAG is that somebody was making a model of a wooden tower clock mechanism like this:

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/79/78/d1/7978d146c35989453239cd8d0d82595e--wooden-gears-gear-clock.jpg

A weight cord perhaps drove the two pulleys, a pendulum would be attached by that collar on the center shaft, and the lever arm on the right side of the top picture looks like it might have been part of a crude escapement mechanism.

But I really don't know; it's just what it looks like to me using a lot of imagination.

Anonymous said...

Dave wins.

rdguy