In a message dated 4/29/2005 1:34:13 AM Eastern Standard Time,
bbenson1@... writes:
WaltKammer@... wrote:

Whale of a discourse on things historical - thanks

> went to a microswitch creating a contact closure for a 12VDC Veeder-Root
> resettable electromechanical counter that we used for odometer readouts of
the

Hmmm, V-R, sounds like a connection

/bb
Bob,

Veeder-Root was a company that still exists today in a different more
diversified form... early on one of their main products was mechanical counters
and
rotational counters as well as other basic mechanical display components that
were used by other vendors. The tie in with rallysport in the olden days was
the fact that they had a line of electromechanical counters which would work
on a 12 VDC power supply. Of course they also had product for aircraft use and
industrial use which ran off of all the special voltages and AC of those
environments.

There were many different 12 VDC models available, including elapsed time
counters used in industrial equipment.

The counters which were really cool had two switches... one would make the
counter ADD and when put in the opposite position the would SUBTRACT counts...
perfect for off route excusions (from what I hear, although for myself I
never went offroute so never needed to use that switch... ha. ha.). The other
switch on the "desirable" model would rezero the counter display. That was
really the cat's meow. A couple of those coupled with some sort of correctable
cable rotation (hence prior ball/cone and plastic gearbox discussion) and a
simple cam/microswitch combination and you were in business with a "Halda
Equivalent" made from junk purchased at the Army/Navy surplus store.

The brand new counters, since they were built for industrial specs and/or
instrument specs were VERY EXPENSIVE from the factory or distributor at the
time.
In 1960's dollars it was a budget breaker! But usually there was a good
supply of surplus models with the reset feature, although the model with the +/-
feature were very hard to find in larger quantities.
Veeder-Root, of course, also had a large line of NON-resettable,
Non-tamperable counters which had application in things like gas station meter
logging
(inside the pumps) as well as logging devices for counting everything from door
closures to industrial production to traffic volume on roadside monitors.

In fact, in keeping with the theme of gas station monitoring, Veeder-Root
presently produces a very sophisticated system which is used for monitoring of
underground fuel storage volumes, tank leakage, and a host of other parameters
related to recordkeeping required by EPA regulations governing petro storage of
any type in above or underground storage tanks. My company has done projects
related to this monitoring on military bases and other government facilities.

Veeder still makes a cheaper line of counters, of course in keeping with
modern times, produced in the Far East. Far cry from the original factory in
Conn, hand crafted by Yankees!!!

So there you have it.

If anyone is interested I can make a few digital shots of different models
and variations that I made or used over the years and which I still have in my
"archive". Drop a note to me if interested.

Regards,
Walt Kammer


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