In Mechanica Antiqua

Released on Valentine’s Day in 1969, the Olivetti Valentine has since been renown as an icon of contemporary industrial design.  The machine was designed in 1968 by Ettore Sottsass, an Italian designer from the Royal College of Art.  Ettore did something that had never been done to a typewriter before—he pushed it past the bounds of utility and into consumerism.  A worldview that now dominates today, but was relatively new in the early 1970s.  The typewriter suddenly became more of a statement piece than a working professional’s machine.  Art critics praised it as “the biro of typewriters,” and “the handbag machine,” highlighting its allure as a consumer item, a fashion statement, and a representation of a new era.  It was so well received that the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York requested one for permanent display.  It remains the only typewriter on permanent exhibition there, as well as the only typewriter with a built in carrying handle.  It’s through and through unique and…

Beautiful machine isn’t it?  I thought so too.  The paint In that lovely 2 tone red caught my eye.  It was an eBay auction I scored for $50.  Nobody bid on it because it was a rusty pile of garbage.  So here’s another short and sweet post full of BTS photos on how I got this thing working again.

One of my only before shots 

Grime and dirt, all frozen up 

Of course, the first thing I did with this machine was strip and polish the body panels.  I was very eager to see how these colors shined up, and I was not disappointed.  The paint was virtually mint.  The body is very easy to remove on these machines, you just need to watch for the shift disengage pin threaded through the back.  Make sure you remember how it sits, and remove it by undoing the knob at the rear.  When you slide the machine out of the lower shell, two of the rear screws will undo a horizontal support rod.  Don’t forget to put that back In place.

Platen rod exits the LEFT

All of the rubber on this machine was shot.  You…

Above you might be able to notice that those key legends are not original to a 1927 Royal Model P, and you would be right.  So here's the catch, I received a broken down corona electra in script, and decided to resolder all the type slugs on my model P for the first ever one and only cursive royal portable.

So what's the quick and snappy rundown on how the hell I did this?  Prepare to burn yourself...many times.

First things first, measure.  Standard pica stands 2/16ths inches tall.  Standard script, at its tallest, is nearly 2/8ths. One eighth larger than most royal slugs. As it turns out, the diameter of the royal platen is slightly larger than the 5 series corona, so the switch was geared to work out fine.



the Corona
Using a handheld blowtorch (made by Jobon and powered by butane) I was able to very quickly remove the script slugs from the electric machine. After that, I stripped the royal type bars and used a propane torch to remove all the standard pica slugs. The type ne…