Leigh KSR-33 Teletype Demonstration - Telephone Museum of P.E.I. [More] ...
Many don't realize it, but some teletypes were made in Canada under license from Teletype Corp.; first by Northern Electric, then by Marsland Engineering, which was then acquired in 1969 by Leigh Instruments who continued the manufacture of these machines. This was to get around import duties and taxes at the time which doubled the cost of a teletype imported from the US.
This is an KSR-33 made by Leigh in the 70's. I acquired it in 1985 from Island Tel who gave several surplus machines to fellow ham radio operators, used it for a year as a computer i/o device, then loaned it to a friend. He used it for a year, and for the next 20 years, it was stored in his barn under less than ideal conditions.
When my friend heard I was looking for a model 33 for the museum, he reminded me about this one, and the next weekend brought it down. Barn storage had been cruel on the machine.
The top cover had been broken in, and squirrels had been living in it, leaving it littered with parts of spruce cones and other seeds. In addition, the storage had been very damp resulting in a lot of rust.
The next few weeks were spent removing rust and replacing damaged parts, the broken cover, etc.
However, as you can see this old baby has been quite resilient, and with some major TLC is now working again. It is a nice feeling bringing something like this back to life!
Here, you see it printing out text from the Internet using a program called Heavy Metal via a Telebyte M65A interface. The first while, it is shown with the cover down, then for a minute or so with cover open, so you can see its printing action, then finally in a shot panning around the museum to other equipment on display in the teletype area.
You can also see a model ASR-33 on display, a model very similar to this one, but with the ability to generate and read paper tape. Videos of that machine and two of my Model 28ASR machine are also viewable on my YouTube channel.
I will be doing additional cleaning of the discolored plastics as I have time.
Leigh Instruments acquired Marsland Engineering in 1969 as part of an expansion. Leigh closed their manufacturing facility completely in 1983 to concentrate on other ventures. Unknown to many, Northern Electric manufactured these for a few years before Marsland started building them, but the quality was poorer due to inferior hardening of metal parts as compared to these and those made by Teletype themselves. Note Leigh's white on blue nameplate, as well as the small Island Tel nameplate on the cover.
When I was doing this video, I didn't quite have the printer inside the case properly, and as a result with the top cover down, the paper was jamming somewhat. This was fixed as the video uploaded. That is why near the beginning of the video, you will see me fiddling with the paper before opening the cover. This is not normal and has been resolved.
My thanks go out to Ken Gartland of Nova Scotia, an ex-CN/CP Telecommunications service technician for going over this machine's printer after I had it operating and setting it to meet factory specs with his test set. Thanks also to the Greenkeys list and to all those who helped me find parts for these machines and who gave me advice and encouragement during their restorations.
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