The original nuts and bolts were 5/32 BSW I believe. Best of luck finding them nowadays

Meccano.  As I understand it, is another of our assets we’ve sold off to the French.  What next, the Crown Jewels?  And just look at some of the abysmal kits (just like Lego) they sell.  They’re hardly encouraging young minds to build something from their imagination like Meccano (and Lego) did some years ago.

I think the number of holes is related to making triangles.  Meccano was invented when triangulated steel structures were all the rage.  Common riveted objects like cranes, towers, bridges, roof spans, ship frames, gantries, machine frames and vehicle chassis could all be modelled in Meccano at a time when they were hi-tech.

Meccano’s downfall was partly due to the march of technology.   Concrete,  streamlining, welding, and monocoque meant openly triangulated structures became less common, and were even considered old-fashioned.  Likewise, interest in gears was replaced by Wireless, then Electronics, and computers.   Now Meccano is primarily an adult hobby, and truly excellent work is done in it.

The absence of even-holed strip is no obstacle to serious Meccano modellers; they just cut a longer strip back and reshape the end.   Quite a few do more sophisticated metal-work, owning a lathe for making Brass parts, and a mill for gears etc.  Bet there are some of them on the forum.

Dave

I have been musing on the “triangle” business in relation to strip lengths. My first thought was to think about right-angled triangles and the integer-sided ones in particular – so 3,4,5 and 5,12,13 and friends. Not sure that any but the first is relevant here as they imply over-long strips. What I then realised is that this means strips of lengths 4,5,6 or multiples thereof – needing even-number hole strips. So, right-angled triangles difficult to make with the standard length strips? Or are my sums up the wall?

However, odd-number hole strips have a middle hole. Is that relevant?

Hi Baz,

Thanks for the link to the Meccano drawings. I have decided to put model engineering on the back burner and go back to my Meccano roots, so the drawings will come in handy to make those parts which some vendors want the Earth for.

All I need now is the sizes of the No 10 Chest. Not to make a replica, but to save me having to work out the sizes. Internal drawer sizes would do.

Regards

Gray,

On 7 January 2024 at 16:35 Clive Brown 1 Said:

On 7 January 2024 at 10:50 Graham Meek Said

…

Does this help?  gives some sizes here

 

… and to think; I swapped mine for a bicycle in about 1965

… not really a wise investment, it would appear 🙁

MichaelG.

On 8 January 2024 at 10:19 Graham Meek Said:

…

That set is cheap. There is a No 8 advertised at £8,000.00+.

My brother-in-law inherited a chest full of Meccano from his dad.   A burly ex-rugby player, he needed help lifting at the dump.  Only mentioned it years ago when I said I was building a Meccano clock.  I was horrified: even then Meccano in good condition, especially complete sets, went for big money.   Meccano in poor condition isn’t valuable, and it’s possible to make a healthy profit by straightening and repainting it.

Last time I checked, the French firm who kept the trade-name are still making new parts but only for themed sets, not general purpose engineering.  Traditional Meccano was popular in India, where a firm made new parts, and probably still does.   Both made nuts and bolts, and they’re probably the most common Whitworth fasteners still being manufactured.    Excellent for Meccano modelling because the coarse threads are so easily done and undone.  Terrible for everything else for the same reason – small diameter coarse Whitworth threads come undone far too easily!

French Meccano had a long relationship with the British firm, starting by making a few parts under licence, then increasingly taking over as the UK operation went pear-shaped.  British sets often contained parts stamped ‘Fabrique en Angleterre’,  ‘Meccano France’, ‘Made in England’ and other variations, and maybe French sets were a mix too.

Meccano’s downfall was partly changing fashion, but mostly the way the business was run later on.  Frank Hornby was an modelling enthusiast, competent engineer and a first-class business man.   When he died, his son took over and seems not to have inherited any of his dads’ talents, or perhaps he just lacked energy.   The business went into a slow decline, and even after it was taken over, UK Meccano lost money, and was eventually shut down.

The French operation did better by only selling a narrow range of products aimed carefully at contemporary children, and these don’t appeal to me at all.  However, the French didn’t make the mistake of assuming what made Meccano popular with boys before WW1 still applied 50 years later.

I recommend traditional Meccano wholeheartedly.  Adults will certainly appreciate it for modelling, prototyping and extensible play.   For some machine modelling purposes, it can be a good substitute for 3D-CAD.  For advanced modellers, Meccano’s pointillist appearance is well-suited to certain high-end models – done well it produces the perfect blend of art and technology evident in the Spitfire and steam-punk.

Dave

On 6 January 2024 at 20:55 SillyOldDuffer Said:

 

.. Quite a few do more sophisticated metal-work, owning a lathe for making Brass parts, and a mill for gears etc.  Bet there are some of them on the forum…

Who?  Me?  Guilty as charged, yer ‘onner.

At age fifteen I needed a left-hand worm gear and turned one up out of a bit of brass rod.  The Meccano right-hand one is indistinguishable from a ½” BSW thread, so I made a LH thread and finished it with a RH chaser. It looked and worked perfectly.

George