Typewriter tune-up: household cleaner edition

DISCLAIMER: I am not, by any means, a professional typewriter restorer or repair(wo)man. I am just an enthusiastic and practiced amateur. And I am honing some self-taught skills.

First, go to the office and fetch that most efficient electronics duster--the compressed air canister. If you don't actually have one of these lying around the house, well, you should. The detachable, narrow straw-nozzle blows powerful gusts of air into the tiny nooks where dust collects but fingers cannot reach. The compressed air canister is the perfect companion for basic typewriter maintenance because that collected dust can cause some rather frustrating sticking and jamming of keys and carriage and other things.


They are complicated beasts underneath.
Then, go to the bathroom for the nail polish remover. The acetone in nail polish remover, an organic alcohol compound, is a very effective solvent. 

 ***SECRET KNOWLEDGE OF A FORMER LIBRARY ASSISTANT: when the gross books landed on my desk, I would pull out the nail polish remover to attack the nastiness gumming up the mylar covers. After a little scrubbing, even the toughest grime came off with the acetone.***

I identified my problem area as the typebar: the metal arm between the key button you press on the keyboard and that actual piece of type that hits the ink ribbon, paper, and platen. I applied the acetone to the bases of the typebars with a narrow paintbrush in order to free up some sticking keys. You really can't be delicate about this business though because working away that grit requires some friction. So I tried as best I could to thread the brush bristles through the slots for the typebars. I would also recommend that you not use cotton swabs for this process because pieces of cotton will be left behind and just gum up the works even more.  NOTE: Be careful not to drip any acetone on the exterior body of the typewriter (top cover, etc.) as it will eat through the pretty paint job.

Under the hood

Lots of patience is required for this process, as it will probably take many repetitions before you finally see that nice smooth type action of a grit-free typewriter. But in the end, it is so worth it! All of my keys are typing nicely now and I can feel a sense of pride at having solved the problem myself, and with things I already had around the house!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Imago" on Hannibal season finale

Image
While watching the eagerly-awaited season 2 finale of Hannibal (one of my absolute favorite TV shows of the moment), I was happily surprised when a vocabulary lesson emerged mid-conversation between Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham. — "Do you know what an imago is, Will?" — "It's a flying insect." — "It's the last stage of a transformation." — "When you become who you will be?" — "It's also a term from the dead religion of psychoanalysis. An imago is an image of a loved one, buried in the unconscious, carried with us all our lives." — "An ideal." — "The concept of an ideal." Of course this term, in both of its definitions, has some great significance for me. It is a word I didn't even know until I stumbled across it in my dictionary browsing and knew immediately that this is the title of my chapbook . It was perfect. So when it snuck up on me again in my favorite TV show, in
Read more

There are birds here

Image
We are now in the full porch-swing of summer, which means Summer Poetry Salons at my beloved Lit House. In celebration of the second salon of the summer on June 24 (tomorrow!), I was given the unbelievably fun task of designing and printing a letterpress broadside for Jamaal May's poem "There Are Birds Here,"  a love song for Detroit. As much I loved this poem on my first reading (and second and third), it was a particularly difficult design challenge. Don't get me wrong — there are so many ways  to illustrate this poem because it is so packed with images. But to illustrate it in a way that actually adds to the text, that builds on the complex foundation set down by the poet — that is the challenge to be met. That is the challenge we always aim to meet at the Literary House Press .   So that means no birds and no buildings. For me, those are the two most obvious, but least important images in this poem. Those details are just the shell around the actual poem
Read more

On the end of a year & a decade: 2019

Image
In this last month of the year, I've had five poems accepted by three different literary journals and two new reviews of my book appear in The Cincinnati Review  and Harbor Review . I also completed the letterpress printing of the Rossetti Prize broadside for American Literary Review , designs for four more digital broadsides , and the initial edits & contributor proofs for Cherry Tree 's sixth issue. Whew! It's been an amazing and overwhelming and utterly fulfilling year ; and I'm riding into the new year on 2019's coattails.  Also featuring the gorgeous handmade scarf that Jehanne Dubrow wove for me this past year. One of my favorite December inventories will always be reflecting on a year's worth of personal accomplishments and progress. By the time the end of the year arrives, it's so easy to forget all that happened just a few short months ago. Making a list has a way of bringing it all into perspective. Here's my roundup for the yea
Read more