Still blows my mind how someone or some group of people at some time without computer aid were able to design this thing to actually work. What a marvel of mechanical complexity.

I served in the air force from 1966-70 as a 363x0 (electro-mechanical relay system repairman) "teletype maintenance". Tech school was in Sheppard AFB in Texas and was 36 weeks/ 5 days-6 hours class/lab days. After basic electronics/test equipment, we trained on only two machines, Teletype M-28 and one Kleinschmidt model. The 363X0 skill code did cover other equipment such as FAX and the machine showed on this video but they were not included in the initial training course. We were told of the "mite-mite" but were told they were only used in the Air Force for the SAC 24/7/365 continuous airborne alternate nuclear authority mission on RC-135 aircraft. Glad I didn't have to try and repair this model, looks to be a real beast to work on. I suspect that they just treated it as a line replaceable item and sent defective units to depot or vendor for repair. Would like to know the unit price paid for this model, I'm sure it was a lot. Never met anyone that worked on it in my 4 years in.

They were actually used on ships right to the end of the 1990s, to receive weather fax updates via Inmarsat.

That printing mechanism is insane and yet it totally works! Thank you for sharing this incredible piece of history!

Astonishing from a modern perspective to see the neat and accurate, super-detailed exploded-view mechanical drawings from so long ago. Equipped with Solidworks you can generate similar looking views in no time at all. But doing it by hand on a drafting table?

You're very lucky to get this one. Most MITEs were 400 Hz AC very few had 60 Hz power supplies!

I remember, back in the early 70s, working on a portable ASCII terminal which used the same prismatic print mechanism. I can't quite remember the manufacturer, but it had an integrated acoustic coupler and the problem was that the metal type elements were glued onto the plastic(?) rotating prism and were falling off due to failure of the bond. I'm not sure we were able to find a glue robust enough to keep the type elements on the prism. The prism on the MITE looks like it's all metal, which is a much better design!

Amazing design, I've never had the chance to see this type of print head up close, but adjusting a round rotary print head is an experience. Nice day 🙂 Tom

Thank you John for donating this, so Marc can show us this beautiful machine :)

If 'X' required use of teletypes,... I might consider coming back. *maybe* 😸. The slo-mo of the printhead is amazing. Watching it slide and "correct" the position and settle into it's next character position is pretty cool.

My favourite music! Always gets my head bopping, even at 5:40 in the morning!

I have collected several different versions of the Mite teleprinter. In addition to the Baudot models they had an ASCII version with more electronics and less mechanical components as well as a amazing hand held teleprinter for in dash mounting in vehicles. I emailed you pictures.

I had to laugh when I saw this video. I was a Radio-Teletype Platoon Leader for the US Army in the late 1980's and we were still using this teletype even then. I think it was finally phased out around 1990.

Regarding the auto-start feature: Obviously, the local keyboard won't be able to start the motor again, because its operation depends on the motor running. Try sending some characters from your test terminal. That should start the motor.

Now I can see where the design of the early "laptops" came from. Cool.

As usual astonishing video and content, a beautiful machine really And let John know that he looks like a lovely person whom anybody would like to talk with extensively about teletypes and vacum tubes

I remember seeing a printer with that same mechanism about 43-44 years ago. I was totally impressed by the design with the print element BEHIND the paper and only the hammer in front of it. I think it had a different design but the same principle with two sets of solenoïds and pulleys driving the print element left and right and around.

thats a beautiful teleprinter! tactical no less ha. amazing

@9:14 If I ever get a ship i am going to name it "The Lazy Dog".

It's good to see who you are, John!

The one on the space shuttle was an AN/UGC-74. It still had electro-mechanical parts. It had a drum printer. US Army got rid of those ~1987. They were supposed to replaced from part of a system using radios, secure telephones, and fax. They dumped all that and kept the radios.

Unbelievable ! Please more videos.

The NASA Shuttle "Interim Teleprinter System" had 63 characters available and the same innards as other teleprinters of its kind. Electronics were inside that took the uplinks via an unused voice radio channel. Of the 63 A-Z uppercase, 0-9, 5 greek letters (alpha, beta, delta, gamma, phi and theta) and punctuation including underscore, overscore, up arrow, down arrow, mathematical symbols > < ~ and so forth. The system was in use until about 1993 or 1994.

What a stunning piece of kit. Would love something like this.

I took part in a RTTY or radio teletype net last night on UHF. Modern computers are radios but still tty with all the modulation tones

Wow! Thats fascinating. I love these old mechanical devices. That old earlier teletype machine is like a living creature to be loved and admired! Birthed, and The product of years of research and manufacture by hundreds of man( and woman) hours! Thankyou for that! Marc.

now we eagerly await Marc's lesson on Tactical Teletyping :) It's not quite a Marc video when you can just plug it in and it works

I still insist that Marc is at the Guru level of the knowledge of common electronics. If youre still not convinced, proove it😉

That's one of the oldest "Have you tried turning it off and on again?"

Weight: ~18.6kg. How can a Frenchman not include it in kilo!

Thanks, John!

And i thought that I'd lost my hearing due to the noise of teletype machines....🤣

I have never seen a machine that types the characters from behind the paper....

The sound of these TTY machines is still magical to me.

That is an amazing machine. The fact that it doesn't have to return to neutral to go to the next character is mind blowing.

Thank you John for collecting all those nice things, and donating them 👍👍👍

That was splendid. That teletype sound always reminds me of the evening news.

I have my own Model 15 that I inherited from my grandpa, & someday I hope to use the videos on your channel to restore it.

Fascinating what they could do in 1958.

It liked running as it improved word image with the workout!

I looked at a MITE at the New England Wireless and Steam Museum this morning.

That TTY in operation in the field gives "side channel attacks" a whole plethora of new meanings...

Loud enough to give away your position to an enemy a mile away!!

Just incredible! I would love to see that print head in slow m . . . AND THERE IT IS! Thanks! 😀

It is a thing of beauty.

I had one just like that at one point. I ended up scrapping it as it'd been dropped at some point, but I kept the keyboard around for a while afterwards. Wish I still had it so I could send it along for spares. Hindsight = 20/20

That mechanism is nuts. Just unreal.

Another interesting video Marc! I never knew the had those very small switches on the front in 1958 already. Always thought that they were from a much later period.

this machine has a fantastic beat to it!😅😅😅 it makes me want to drum along with it🤪🤪🤪

IT’S WHISPER QUIET!!!

Re MITE, could they have been hoping we would call it MIGHTY? It sure is! I love the idea of moving things as the bits come in.

What a delight

If I remember well, the "red phone line" from the presidents of USA and USSR, in reality was a coded RTTY link with these machines and all the diplomatic traffic between ambassadors and homeland in all the world was with RTTY.

Randomness - just worked out what your intro/them tune reminds me of - Super Mario Sunshine N64 (or was it gamecube or wii?) - where you had to literally clean the town up with a water pump backpack thing. Perhaps not the same tune, but I seem to remember it had a similar cheery theme before each level :)

Unlike modern devices, it is possible to see and understand how this teletype works, and is completely serviceable. Having the rotation axis of the print head parallel with the platten is an interesting solution. On the classic ASR33, the orientation of the axes are orthogonal.

'bracket' vs. 'parentheses' : A bracket are "[ ]" and parentheses are "( )". But some people are saying brackets and meaning the parentheses.

Excellent! Reminiscent in some ways to the old ICL type barrel printers but slower for obvious reasons! I also presume that groups of letters on the barrel/cylinder were designed so minimal rotation was needed. Did you need to change this for different languages that might have different incidences of each letter? Again, I guess speed, unlike the large mainframe line printers, was not really an issue here!

What an incredible machine! And... Who know there was a TT in the Shuttle?

Brilliant machine and print head. Looking forward to future videos and tear downs

The number of parts in this thing probably exceeds the number of transistors on a chip that would be able to decode the signal. Freakin impressive build, and a joy to watch it working.

Somehow I'm still worried that there there's a Rifa cap about to blow up in that thing.

I used a TI Silent 700 in the late 70s.....

Is that an 833? Our Gates AM transmitter had four. Two for RF and Two for AM modulation. The power transformer was the size of 4 Costco chickens. The modulation transformer was about the same size.

I was once "allowed" to try my skill in sending a short message on an old WW2 German Field Teletype. It depended on me hitting each character at a specific time slot. Well, I could not! I already before that knew I was no drummer... My mother had once stopped my attempt to play piano somewhere (most likely at my godparents' house), because my "rhythm" was no RHYTHM. It still is not.

10:20 The tty equivalent to a screen saver.

Elegant mechanism! 👍

I regret that I gave but one like to give.

Amazing machine… wow that mechanical print head in the back of paper sheet and the pulley work are insane 😮

I am curious about the use of teletypes in WW2 by other nations, particularly Japan and China: Considering their vastly different alphabet, did they use them at all? Did they have modified versions that could deal with the Kanji? I once saw a Japanese "typewriter" from that era, a scary monstrosity where every single character had to be picked by hand on some sort of x-y-table.

Is it me or is the box on the right a bit noisier then the left teletype?

When did military Telitypes start using displays instead of relying on a printer as the only output?

Am I first? Hm seems like I'm so early audio hasn't arrived yet. Now there is sound. 😊

Is it just me, or is there no audio?

I like JACKDAWS LOVE MY BIG SPHINX OF QUARTZ instead of quick brown fox.

I think the auto correct needs some adjustment.

IT IS SO LOUD, WHY? Is there a noisy motor that clocks the machine?

I ❤ W A R G A M E S !

Um, 60 speed is 45.5 baud which is essentially a bit time. So bit not char when citing the 45.5. (It's messier than that with start and stop mushed in there. But, you get the idea, I am sure.) This is still extant in some amateur radio stations. BTW - if you get the fax machine contemporary with that period I bet I have a treat for you. (And I have not forgotten the 2100S BASIC interpreter source. I still have to scan the bloody thing.) {^_^}

kinda reminds me of FADAC

✌️✌️

Watt did the fox say?

Ah, finally the audio has returned.

11:16 as observed, an adage as old as time. If it doesn't work, turn it off and on again. :))

Is that an amplifier in Johns rack? looks funky :D (5:30)

Looks like the doodly do doodly didn't.

Nice, pretty intricate, but ... all mechanical !!!!

No audio

Yes all posts to X should be made by Telletype 😂

What a beautiful machine and as we know a thing of beauty is ...

@6:08 - To be fair, Gomer Pyle U.S.M.C had a pretty skinny neck too, but he was 'Americas soldier.' for many years. I keed, I keed!

Look, it’s only 41 pounds. 💀

Not a video for headphone users :)

But there must have been some form of Cryptosystem to prevent the enemy from finding out what your guys are up to as no one wants to get shot at.

kool

I hear the audio!

The "Swiss" comment led me on a Goober search to find that it was made by a US company. ps Marc should wear steel toe-cap footwear in such situations.

Irrelevant, but I just got my hands on a late 50's/early 60's RCA tube reel to reel. Its the Type EDT-3 "Scholastic" and it comes from a company in Harrisburg, PA that happens to still be in business. They have been in business since 1929. Does anyone know anything at all about it or can anyone put it to use? In all my searching the internet so far - I have only found ONE relevant video of the machine.

Нет звука 🔇

If you think electronics are complicated look inside a mechanical teleprinter.