Need info on Brunsviga, Odhner, type calculators including original pricing and how to pronounce

[CalcGuy]

Hi gang.

 

I need to get some information on a Brunsviga mechanical calculator - probably one of the pinwheel rotary types, but I don't know for sure just yet.  I've picked up some great general info on the web and will use that in my basic discussion but I had a couple of detailed questions that might add a bit of color to the discussion.  If anyone can help, I think the members of this group can.

1. What was the original pricing of the calculators during the 1910 to 1940 period.  I know it will vary by model, but rough numbers are good.  I've been seeing $300 to $600 at that time (30s?)  which might equate to $4,000 to $7,000 today.  Does anyone know what approximate numbers I can use?
2. How do you pronounce Brunsviga & Odhner?  I'm thinking Bruns-vega and Ahdner.  Close?  Badly wrong?
3. Did Brunsviga go out of business in the 70s or so?  I've seen an interesting 1970s vintage electronic calculator with their name on it, but was the name sold to another company after they closed down?  
4. What sort of value are we seeing today?  I'm seeing models in good working condition averaging about $300 on ebay.  Is that realistic for an average model - with prices rising a whole bunch if it's particularly rare?

In the Southern California (US) area, is there anyone who buys these?  I assume this model is in fair shape, possibly doesn't work, and is probably an average model.  I may be surprised and I'd be happy to pass your contact info on when I see the current owner.

 

Thanks!

 

Guy

(Guy Ball)

[Donkey Bait]

I have a brunsviga adding machine (1910) for sale, if you are interested.....

Paul

07763171227

paul...@me.com

Sent from my IPhone 

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "OldCalculatorForum" group.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/oldcalculatorforum/-/0o_YK4wI4wkJ.
To post to this group, send email to oldcalcul...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to oldcalculatorfo...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/oldcalculatorforum?hl=en.

[epopy]

Hi Guy,

Visit the following web site. You will find a lot of info about the brand.

http://www.rechnerlexikon.de

We can find there some prices for models from 1909 :

Model A : 705 Mark, B : 505 Mark, D : 1005 Mark, G : 1215 Mark, MB : 605 Mark.

From an conversion table (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_W%C3%A4hrungsgeschichte ) we can say that 1 Mark (1900) = 6,00 Euros.
So the base model (B) could cost in actual dollars 505*6*1,2163 = 3700 $.

For the pronunciation it is "Broonssveega" and Oh-dner (better you can visit this link : www.germanlanguageguide.com )

Best regards
epopy

[calcucris]

Hi Guy,

See also www.crisvandevel.de/bvex.htm

1. What was the original pricing of the calculators during the 1910 to 1940 period.  I know it will vary by model, but rough numbers are good.  I've been seeing $300 to $600 at that time (30s?)  which might equate to $4,000 to $7,000 today.  Does anyone know what approximate numbers I can use?

A pinwheel calculator in the 1910's to 1940's cost approximately 1 to 3 months' wages, depending on the features it had. 

 

1. How do you pronounce Brunsviga & Odhner?  I'm thinking Bruns-vega and Ahdner.  Close?  Badly wrong?

Phonetic spelling attempt with American accent in mind ...

Broons - vee- gah and Oh- dnur 

1. Did Brunsviga go out of business in the 70s or so?  I've seen an interesting 1970s vintage electronic calculator with their name on it, but was the name sold to another company after they closed down?  

Brunsviga was taken over in the the 1950s by Olympia Wilhelmshaven. Olympia continued to produce mechanical claculators in Braunschweig under the Brunsviga name. After they stopped production of mechanical calculators in the early 60's, Olympia continued to sell cheap Spanish mechanical calculators under the name into the late 60s and used it on occasion for other Olympia products. The Braunschweig factory (making other things in the mean time) was moved in 1967, and finally closed in 1979. Olympia did have a line of electronic calculators too. Olympia itself closed in the early 1990s.

1. What sort of value are we seeing today?  I'm seeing models in good working condition averaging about $300 on ebay.  Is that realistic for an average model - with prices rising a whole bunch if it's particularly rare?

It depends - a lot- on what type of machine it is. The pre-standardization models (before 1927) are worth more than later ones, and there is a wide variety in what comes to the market. Some models are very rare, and hence pricey. In Europe, an average 1940-1960 Brunsivga (13 ZK, 13 RK, ...) is worth between 20 and 70 EUR, depending on condition. When blocked and rusty, and with parts missing, it's probably more useful as a boat anchor :-). Earlier, they're worth more. Maybe 80-200 EUR for an average Brunsviga B. Very nice, all original and early, with cover ...up to 300-400 EUR

  

In the Southern California (US) area, is there anyone who buys these?  I assume this model is in fair shape, possibly doesn't work, and is probably an average model.  I may be surprised and I'd be happy to pass your contact info on when I see the current owner.

 

Thanks!

 

Guy

(Guy Ball)

Best regards,

Cris 

[mg]

Hello Guy,

My guess is that the prospective buyers in the US fall into two groups: those who know a lot about these machines, and those who just like the idea of having an old calculator as a novelty.  The first group will know exactly what you are selling and will pay a premium for a rare machine, working or not, but may be unlikely to pay attention to anything else.  This is a very, very small group in the US, but much larger in Europe. The second group would be unconcerned with what model it is as long as it is working - much larger group, but less likely to work on the machine themselves.  So, if you have a common machine that is not working, it can be difficult to find a buyer.  This was my experience when I moved house last year and tried to cull down my collection before the move.

The market in the US is not big enough for prices to be well established.  I have been collecting for almost 20 years, and the average price of the machines in my collection has stayed remarkably constant at $35.  So, when asked, I usually state that the general going rate for a standard mechanical calculator, complete but not working, is about $35; a bit more if it is fully working, in truly excellent condition, or has accessories, and a bit less if it is in poor cosmetic condition or has missing parts.  Machines that are particularly rare would obviously be more valuable.

As Cris and others more knowledgeable than I have pointed out, Brunsviga merged with Olympia in 1959.  The electromechanical Brunsvigas were phased out shortly thereafter so as not to compete with the Olympia machines, but the mechanical Brunsvigas continued to be produced until 1971. The last mechanical Brunsviga was the 13RM, which shows up in the 1970/71 Büromaschinen Lexikon, but is gone by 1972.  See http://www.rechenkasten.de/BueromaschinenLexikon/

--

Mark

[CalcGuy]

Great information.  Thank you all for your help. 

 

 

I'm still waiting to get model information on the Brunsviga - or more complete photos - from my contact.  I'm posting the only one they sent me. You can see how the Grimme, Nataus & Co name is on the front.  Does this help approximately date the model?  And they have been calling it a "Braunschweig" but I assume it was built in Braunschweig (or that's where the company was based if it was built in a different factory) but as far as I can tell, the manufacturer did not have a model with that name.

 

Another question.  My main experience in mechanical calculators was of what I think is called "key-driven" (Comptometer, Burroughs, etc.) with the hand lever on the right side.  It appears that the pinwheel calculator has the ability to do more complex math and the key-driven is possibly cheaper to manufacture, but is there more to the story than that?  Did some industries favor one over the other and did that hurt the sales of the pinwheel (which I assume are the older styles)?

 

Again, thank you all for your continued help & background info.  I will try to make you all proud of your calculator interest as I discuss this Brunsviga to an audience who knows nothing about it.  It appears because of convenience and time, I have been chosen to speak a little bit about it's history on an odd TV program here in the US.  (Storage Wars)  I probably have 30 seconds to make sense of a topic that deserves hours.  Thanks to your help, I will do the best I can!

 

[CalcGuy]

Here's a couple of new photos.  I was hoping for a model # plate, but no luck.  Again, if someone can give me an approximate date, I would appreciate it.  Also, is the additional Stjerngren sticker from a dealer?  Was it standard for a dealer to put their label on the calculator?

Thanks!

 

Guy

 

[mg]

Hello Guy,

If you only need to add numbers, key-driven calculators are pretty fast.  That's all the key-driven mechanism can do - add numbers.  As soon as you press the button for the number, it is already added to the total.  Subtraction is a bit more difficult, since you need to trick the mechanism into subtracting by adding the complement of the number (those are the smaller numbers on each of the keys).  Actually, you need to add one less than the complement, which is a bit awkward but not really all that difficult.  Multiplication and division are very tedious on a key-driven calculator, but possible by simply doing repeated addition (for multiplication) or subtraction (for division).  I believe key-driven calculators were most commonly used for business calculations involving money.

Pinwheel calculators were much faster for multiplication and division than the key-driven calculators.  You set the numbers with a lever for each digit of the multiplicand, and then turn the crank "x" times for the ones digit of the multiplier, then shift the carriage over one place and turn the crank for the tens digit of the multiplicand, and so on.  Addition is simply multiplying by "1", so pinwheel calculators are not nearly as fast for addition and subtraction as a key-driven calculator.  Pinwheel calculators were used often in science and engineering.

In the 1930s Facit combined a crank-driven pinwheel mechanism with a modern 10-key keyboard for number entry.  These calculators were very versatile and were made until the mid-70s.

Since they have different strengths and weaknesses, all of these types of calculators survived until the end of the mechanical era.

--

Mark

[calcucris]

Hi Guy,

There is no clear correlation between serial numbers and an existing list somewhere for Brunsviga machines, but it is a Brunsviga model MA, or so called "Midget" in the US. However, since this particular machine appears to have been sold in Denmark (yes, it's a dealer sticker, and yes, it was common to add it), it doesn't carry that inscription. You can find many of its sisters illustrated at at

http://www.rechenmaschinen-illustrated.com/Brunsviga%20MA.htm 

I would guess it dates from the mid 1920's, as it has a relatively late serial number for this series of machines, and on the switch-over to exchangeable parts models the serial numbers hover around 100.000, and this was in 1927.

Best regards,

Cris

[GCNige]

Hi all,

I have just made a search on Youtube and there are some interesting videos of various mechanical calculators being demonstrated.

For example a search on "Brunsviga" brings up several including a basic one at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCbr65JZadQ

Other people demonstrate such things as performing square roots.

Try other search phrases such as "pinwheel calculator" for further results.


Best regards,
Nigel T.

[Timo]

Hi Guy,

According to "The American Digest of Business Machines" printed in 1924 the prices of different Brunsviga models varied between $275 (model B) and $425 (model Triplex). Your Brunsviga is the large capacity (18 digits) version of the miniature model called "model A midget" and its price was $350. Because it was rather expensive, it is not common now, not even in Germany. The best place to sell it would perhaps be the group "Antiquitäten & Kunst > Technik & Photographica > Antike Bürotechnik > Rechenmaschinen & Rechenschieber" of German eBay.
Regards,

Timo

[Andrea Celli]

Sory for long delay in ansering :-(

I can find a list of prices for Brunsviga machines here
http://rechnerlexikon.de/it/artikel/Benutzer:Celli#Brunsviga

I found these prices in inventory registers of my Institute.
Roughly an Italian Lira (ITL) in 30ies was equivalent to a current Euro
You can calculate the official rate using thi XLS table
http://www3.istat.it/dati/catalogo/asi2003/PDF/T/22/2212.xls
Take care that in Italian we use a comma (,) between  units and decimals and a dot (.) to mark thousands. Values are in Italian liras, one Eur is equivalent to 1936.27  ITL

Until 50ies, Calculators (4 operations) and Adding Machines (2 operations) was two separate markets.
Adding machines was intended for easy use in accounting. They often had a reduced keyboard and a printing facility. It was quite pitiable to perform multiplication with them. To sums was a quite immediate job
Calculators was designed to perform multiplications and divisions. No matter if input was slow. The main time was spent in computing. A printed output was not so important. It was better to have a feature allowing to recycle results for a new computation.

 Andrea

2012/7/24 Timo <timo.l...@gmail.com>

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "OldCalculatorForum" group.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/oldcalculatorforum/-/L3OIAFS7GIUJ.

[CalcGuy]

Thank you to all who helped me on this.  Their film crew came out Monday and the taping went great.  The show is being edited (my portion will only be about 2 minutes out of the whole 30 minutes of show) and they tell me it will be shown in about 4-5 weeks.  The show is called Storage Wars and is shown on the A&E (Cable) Network here in the US.  When I hear it is being shown, I will pass the word.

Thanks to all of your input and the additional research I did, I think I was able to represent the Brunsviga and mechanical calculators well.  I'm hoping that when they edit the footage, they don't "make fun of" collecting calculators too much.  (I can accept a little humor at my expense - it's not a collectible most people appreciate like we do.)  But I think it will come across well - and smartly - and we had some great information to share.  With all the little details you all helped me with (even down to the label indicating the dealer in Denmark), I think we will impress the audience.    (If not, at least we got mechanical calculators on national/international TV.)

Thanks again & best regards to you all!

Guy

[Nicholas Bodley]

On Fri, 20 Jul 2012 14:18:16 -0400, CalcGuy <mrc...@pacbell.net> wrote:

How do you pronounce Brunsviga & Odhner?

What follows is likely, but native speakers of German are very welcome to correct me!

"Broons-veega", approximately; the "u" is not really like "moon", it's a bit more like that in "put". 

Not sure about Odhner, but the first letter is probably pronounced as we say the name of the letter "O" in English. (Is Kevin Odhner on this list, btw?). The "...ner" is probably like the end of the word "partner".

{So sorry not to have been participating recently! A few years ago, I couldn't imagine missing a message on a calc. list, but recently I've been away from e-mail almost totally. It's all too easy to subscribe to interesting lists and other periodic mailings, and as everybody knows, there are simply scads of them.  ("Scad", usually plural, means a very large amount or number [of]; oodles.)}

A neighbor just showed me a $3 scientific calc. he'd bought at a bargain ("Job Lot") store. It had a hinged cover, and looked nice, but... it would spontaneously clear, or "forget" the first operand quite often.

My best to all!

-- 

Nicholas Bodley _.=|*|=._ Waltham, Mass.

Philosophers might like to contemplate the

curious similarities of CPU instruction sets

and organ stoplists.
 

[Nicholas Bodley]

On Sat, 21 Jul 2012 14:10:06 -0400, CalcGuy <mrc...@pacbell.net> wrote:

Another question. My main experience in mechanical calculators was of what I think is called "key-driven" (Comptometer, Burroughs, etc.) with the hand lever on the right side.

I recall reading a book about calculators written perhaps in the 1920s (by Turck?) that distinguished between key-driven and key-set categories, with the implicit emphasis on digit entry keys. (As most of us probably know, that hand level clears the machine, unless I'm rather badly confused.)

It appears that the pinwheel calculator has the ability to do more complex math

It has the great advantage of retaining the number entered into the pinwheels. Square root by the fives method should be easy on Brunsvigas, Ohdners, and nimiar types with setting levers. (Not so on ten-key Facits, though!)

I'd dearly, almost passionately love to know whether twin calculators (Brunsvigas and probably Marchants) could calculate trig. functions, and, if so, did they use an algorithm akin to CORDIC? I'd love to know any details of the type of calculations they did. Apparently they were used in gunnery and surveying, at least.

 and the key-driven is possibly cheaper to manufacture, but is there more to the story than that?

I plainly remember that one must not force the keys down on a Comptometer; whether a Burroughs is more robust, I don't know. A Comptometer has error-preventing functions in its mechanism (especially to protect from "short-stroking" -- releasing a key before its stroke is complete), so it's more complicated than a simple increment-and-carry mechanism would be. Every column of digits has an error-prevention mechanism; that adds complexity and cost.

Whether a key-driven type is less costly to make, I don't know, but that seems possible. Key-driven types don't have carriages (as far as I know), and carriages add to cost. However, key-set machines don't require error-prevention mechanisms for every column of digits, which simplifies them.

Did some industries favor one over the other

I assume you mean customers? Key-driven types, it seems quite likely, were favored for simple business calculations. As some/many of us know, there were schools for Comptometer operators, and that was a job skill that was once useful to have.  As to makers, key-driven types competed with key-set types, I'd say.

Key-set (and pinwheel) types were easier to use for multiplication and division (and, surely square root).

(Square root should be possible on a key-driven machine, but doing it by the fives method surely took concentration (and a pencil and paper to write down root digits...)}

Some key-driven machines had keys only for digits 1 through 5, as probably many of us know. Larger digits required two keystrokes to enter. Comptometer operators apparently entered larger digits with two strokes; it was faster than repositioning one's arm and hand to reach the keys for the larger digits.

and did that hurt the sales of the pinwheel (which I assume are the older styles)?

Key-driven machines, it seems to me, are great for adding and subtracting lists of numbers. I haven't used a directly-set* pinwheel machine, but I'd think it would be rather inconvenient as a plain adding machine.

I used to own a Curta I, and it definitely was relatively inconvenient to use as an adder. I don't know enough to say whether key-driven machines hurt sales of key-set machines, but a given customer, it seems, would buy one or the other. but probably not both.

*Ten-key Facits are key-set pinwheel machines. Keys cam the rotating part that extends and retracts the pins; they cam it to the proper position. That rotating part, also a cam, is normally locked, and unlocked just before setting a digit into that particular position. Releasing a number-setting key re-locks the rotating cam. Like a number of other machines, it's internally biquinary; each digit position has only five extendable teeth. There are four single independent teeth, and the fifth extendable part is a five-tooth sector. See John Wolff's Web pages on the Facit [C1-13, fairly sure] for photos. The extend/retract cam moves in one direction for digits 1..4, and the other way for 5..9.

By analogy with electrical/electronic data transmission, key-driven and full-keyboard key-set types can be regarded as parallel-entry machines, while ten-key types are definitely serial-entry machines.

Best regards,

[Nicholas Bodley]

On Sun, 22 Jul 2012 12:44:00 -0400, calcucris <cr...@crisvandevel.de> wrote:

Cris

Oh, shucks; I should have read all messages before replying! Sorry.

Not a "terrible sin", by far, though.

Best,

[Andrea Celli]

Brunviga is the Latin name of Braunschweig, in English Brunswick.
The town where Grimme Natalis & Company was based.

Then the problem is: how a German reads a Latin word. :-)

By the way, we could note what several German calculators was named
from the Latin name of the town: Lipsia (Leipzig), Hannovera
(Hannover), Berolina (Berlin), Mellitta (Mellis), ...

Andrea


2012/8/14 Nicholas Bodley <nbo...@speakeasy.net>:

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
> "OldCalculatorForum" group.

[calcucris]

Op zaterdag 21 juli 2012 14:56:38 UTC+2 schreef calcucris het volgende:

Phonetic spelling attempt with American accent in mind ...

Broons - vee- gah and Oh- dnur 

By the way, and I suspect this may not be common knowledge, a Swedish friend of mine surprised me with the correct Swedish pronunciation of "Odhner". It is pronouced with "oo" as in "you". So, Ooh- dner. Or if you prefer German spelling - Uh-dner.

Cris

[Timo]

Even though I am not a swede, I disagree about the pronunciation of the name Odhner. In school I had to learn Swedish for 8 years, so I have some knowledge of the language. At the beginning of a Swedish word "o" is often but not always pronounced as German "u". For example the first "o" (but not the second) of the surname "Olsson" is pronounced so.

People can naturally decide themselves, how they want to pronounce their names. In the case of W.T: Odhner we can look at the cyrillic transliteration of his name. The Russians have a nice habit of transliterating latin names so that they can pronounce them as correctly as possible. The first 1878 appearance of Odhner in the magazine of the Imperial Russian Technical Society was in the form "Уднер" (transliterated as "Udner"), but always after that "Однер" ("Odner") has been used in Russian literature. Also in Sweden I have discussed with several people about Odhner and all of them have used the German "o" at the beginning. The last time was a week ago at the archive of Gothenburg (Göteborg) city museum, where I studied their Odhner material.

My suggestion is such that the stress should be at the beginning, "o" should be long and "h" cannot be heard, in German like "oodner". In English something like nOt-nOt-D-N-sEt-R.

Timo

[calcucris]

Thanks Timo, for putting me and my Swedish friend straight - it is much appreciated!

Best wishes,

Cris


Op donderdag 15 november 2012 17:28:21 UTC+1 schreef Timo het volgende: