Royal Electric Braille Ticker Machine 1930

ca. 1930s

Pictured here are the 3 components of the machine. At the left is the ticker tape printer component and in the middle is a manual Royal typewriter. The silver box on the right is a vented box which contains a dozen vacuum tubes. Both the ticker machine and the manual typewriter have electrical wires that lead back to the aluminum power source box. A second wiring interface runs from under the typewriter to ticker. I can only assume that what was typed on the typewriter was transmitted to the ticker machine and printed. I believe that it is possible that this is a demonstration machine that produced electronic braille.

 

This is a closer view of the ticker printer portion of the device and next to the typewriter you can see the interface cable between the 2 components.

 

 

Side view of the ticker printer. Stock ticker machines are an ancestor of the modern computer printer, being one of the first applications of transmitting text over a wire to a printing device.

 

 

The underside of the vacuum tube box showing all the hand soldered connections of the tubes. It is my guess that the box functioned as a voltage regulator.

 

 

The marked area shows a 3 by 2 configuration of what appears to be pins or bars. Which would confirm the conclusion that this contraption converted manual typing automatically to braille.

 

 

View of the undercarriage of the Royal typewriter showing the wired connectors.

 

 

Overhead view of the ticker tape pathway.

 

 

Closeup of the electronics showing the data and power wires entry into the printer.

 

 

The brailled on/off switch on the side of the printer box.

 

 

The picture above shows the underside of the printer box that show the other side of the on/off switch and a bell with its motor.

 

 

The left panel of the Royal typewriter.  The panel has a lever that follows a setting of 0 to 6.

 

 

Connecting interface plug between the typewriter and the ticker tape machine. Eight progs connect to the eight wires shown in the undercarrage of the printer.