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Blog
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Ringing like 1984: Western Electric “Princessâ€
Western Electric “Princess†compact telephone from 1984 I got this phone at a junk swap event. It had a broken handset jack, but I got a replacement from OldPhoneWorks.
It has a distinctive, loud ring:
(Alternative Freesound link: Western Electric Princess Telephone Ringing)
That’s a lot of noise from a small phone!
Western Electric “Princess†compact telephone — base. Note mid-1984 production date: after the US Bell breakup If you want the ringtone for your phone, here it is as an Ogg file for Android: WesternElectric-Princess_Ring-mobile.zip
Western Electric “Princess†Telephone Ringing Recording © 2018, Stewart C. Russell — scruss.com provided under the Creative Commons — Attribution 2.5 Canada — CC BY 2.5 CA licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/ca/
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Rose plots
source by Dan Anderson: https://www.openprocessing.org/sketch/519299
Enlarged and plotted on a Roland DXY pen plotter: 0.7 mm black pen on design vellum.Full page:
Even if the 0.7 mm pen is a bit chunky for fine guilloché effects, the plotter output is pretty crisp. Here’s a detail at full resolution:
select this to see the full resolution scan. Original is just under 6 cm wide Unfortunately, an earlier attempt to print this figure using a fresh-out-the-box 20+-year-old HP SurePlot ¼ mm pen on glossy drafting paper resulted in holes in the paper and an irreparably gummed-up pen. If anyone knows how to unblock these pens, I’m all ears …
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In an otherwise blank concrete wall …
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Photo taken at: Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital
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birb chirper v2.0
This is one of those toys that you whirl around on a piece of string and it makes a chirping sound like a flock of sparrows. I have no idea what they’re called, so I called it birb_chirper.
Print Settings
Printer: Reach 3D
Rafts: Doesn’t Matter
Supports: Doesn’t Matter
Resolution: 0.3 mm
Infill: 0%Notes: This is a thin-walled model, so use at least two shells and no infill for smooth walls.
Post-Printing
Take a piece of thin string about 1 metre long (I used micro-cord, very fine paracord), pass it through the hole in the tip, then tie off a jam knot that’s big enough to stop in the hole in the top but still pass back through the slot in the side. Now whirl the thing around fast by the string, and it should start to chirp.
This is intended for the amusement of small children and the annoyance of adults.
How I Designed This
The tip of this thing is an ogee curve. I’ve included my library for creating simple ogee and ogive profiles in OpenSCAD.
// ogive-ogee example // scruss, 2018 use <ogive_and_ogee.scad>; ogive(20, 35); translate([0, -5])text("ogive(20,35)", size=3); translate([30, 0])ogee(20, 35); translate([30, -5])text("ogee(20,35)", size=3);Download: Thingiverse —birb_chirper by scruss. Local copy: birb_chirper.zip
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western electric marbling
accidental marbling found in injection-moulded recycled plastic microphone cup in a 1984 Western Electric 2702 (Princess) telephone handset
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When you fix a thing and it just works …
Skelf is a Scots word for splinter or shard and is a weak pun on the Stealth clips that splintered for me. When both clips broke within a week on my Timbuk2 messenger bag, I knew I had to do something. This coincided with me fixing my 3d printer (it was the extruder feed: it was too loose all along!), so I was able to prototype a new clip.
The files are on Thingiverse: Messenger Bag Replacement 25 mm Webbing Clip, or there’s a local copy here: Messenger_Bag_Replacement_25_mm_Webbing_Clip.zip.
