This well preserved Underwood Champion from 1935 was hanging up mid-carriage and the owner, being mechanically inclined made adjustments. That worked just fine for awhile then…..that annoying hang up just wouldn’t go away and that ALWAYS means drastic measures must be taken! For me, drastic measures would be to call my local typewriter repair person (hint, hint). For this incredibly nice customer it meant taking the machine apart until there was no knowing what needed adjusting. Indeed, when it came to our door step the entire escapement mechanism was so bound up I could hardly move it back and forth.
I really like this customer as they brought all the parts that were removed and had a good confession to boot. Not only that, they use the typewriter all the time so they were very nervous about getting it back. Of course, when I chatted about our current 8 week back log the moving to the East coast situation came to light. To those that use their machines every day, we are happy to bump them up in the repair queue, even when it is customer induced typewriter abuse. I promised they would have the typewriter in time for the move.
Now to the repair. There was so much out of whack, and parts all eschew that Mr. Montgomery helped advise on where to start. Note the lovely (HA!) side panels. Who in their infinite wisdom thought up that scheme? They would not be hard to get out of the way except Underwood used set screws through the frame which are notorious to break. Once those were thrown across the room I could see what needed to be done.
First order of business was loosening the escapement rack screws to relieve the tension. Next I returned the shift return spring, set screws and pivot to their proper locations adjusting so there was no shift binding and just barely enough lost motion for carriage response. The escapement return spring was put back, then onto testing type action. The type escapement timing was too soon on the Q side and way late on the P side. This adjustment of the side to side motion then took us to basic escapement timing, reconnecting the margin release, releasing tension on the very wound up draw band spring, drilling out and replacing a broken margin rack screw, aligning the margin rack so the margin stop worked and then to the tab rack. Once the tab tower was reinstalled the tap stop was not pushing the tab stops down far enough. A simple side to side adjustment and it was done. Oh, does the carriage hang up? After all that, no way!