Meccano - SpeedyLook encyclopedia

Outline

Meccano is a Building set containing entirely metal elements in the beginning.

The prefabricated standard modules were metal blades perforated with the step of ½ inch (1,27 cm): as of the beginning, the very wide collection of elements comprised angles, plates, axes, wheels and gears out of brass because the initial goal was initiation with the Mécanique. Of course, the originality of the invention is the constant step of the holes of assembly which is done by means of screw and of nuts.

With the wire of time, the range of parts largely evolved/moved: parts disappeared from the system, of news were created, some parts are now in Plastic.

In France, the Club of the Friends of Meccano gathers the followers, manufacturers and collectors of the play. It are named meccanophiles or meccano fans .

Meccano is an exclusive mark of the Meccano company.

The word Meccano became since a common noun to qualify a device which is built by assembly of modular elements.

Lastly, Meccano is distributed to the United States under the mark Erector .

History of Meccano

All began in 1898 with Liverpool, in a small store where Frank Hornby had fun to invent a building set de containing screw and nuts for his/her children. It thus gave rise to the Meccano system in 1901.

Frank Hornby develops its system and markets it under the mark “Mechanics Made Easy” (“mechanics made easy”). The word Meccano appeared in 1907.

The first Meccano factory opens with Liverpool in 1907; very quickly this factory is replaced to face a request for increased production. Vis-a-vis the world success of Meccano, two new factories open, in Berlin in 1912 and Belleville (in France), in 1920. The factory of Belleville is very quickly replaced by that of Bobigny, just beside Paris, and which in 1951 can produce more than 500.000 boxes of Meccano per day.

A new factory is built with Calais in 1959; it is still today the principal production site of the Mecccano offer.

In the years 1950, Lines Brother approaches the company Miro (board game) and forms the Miro company - Meccano.

In the years 1970, the company General Millets takes possession of Meccano; the production site of Calais is then the only world production site. During this period, Meccano was not the priority of the General Group Millets and very few developments take place; Meccano is resold in 1985.

In the years 1990, the Meccano group is reorganized; the offer is now based on two systems of generic construction (metal and plastic). Each system is intended for different age brackets:

the plastic, makes it possible to the children as from 4 years to discover the Meccano system, thanks to a system of parts/screw/nut especially designed for them ( Build&Play );

metal, heart of range of Meccano, makes it possible to the child as from 8 years to build an infinity of objects. Three ranges are available: Multimodèles , Special Design and Edition .

New ranges made their appearance in 2005: Speed Play as from 7 years, Tuning , and Kids Play as from 2 years.

Meccano was repurchased in 2000 by the Japanese group Nikko (leader of the radio car ordered in France). The company is also saddle jib crane of the toys Wow-Wee (Robosapien, etc), Crayola , Nikko , and Maisto .

In years 1970/1980, Meccano France in addition was the distributer of toys resulting from imported films or series of the the United States as the Man who was worth 3 billion or Star Wars. (see also Kenner).

The figurines Star Wars placed on blister Meccano are very rare and required.

At the time of THESE of Las Vegas in January 2007, Erector, subsidiary the U.S.A. of Meccano, Spyke, a robot communicating presented to assemble oneself.

Constitution of the system

The principal types of parts are:

right or curved punched tapes;
plates flexible, plane or curved, unquestionable transparent, or rigid, with or without edges;
angles, longitudinal beams and beams;
pulleys, Tires in Rubber and Driving belts;
the Gears S (pinions, wheels, endless screw, crowns with interior/external teeth and toothed racks) of various sizes;
wheels toothed for drive chains;
rods and cranks various lengths;
accessories of connection (squares, brackets, base plates, etc);
mechanical accessories (joint of Cardan joint, Coupling, Eccentric arm, , pawl, Ratchet wheel, etc);
Driving S, mechanics, electric and with vapor to animate the models.

The pinions and toothed wheels allow reports/ratios 1/2 (pinion of 25 teeth and toothed wheel of 50 teeth), 1/3 (19 and 57 teeth), 1/4 (15 and 60 teeth), 1/5 (19 and 95 teeth) and 1/7 (19 and 133 teeth).

Basic boxes and complementary boxes

There were numbered complete boxes, by order of increasing number of parts, 0 (box of initiation) to 10 (box provided with three drawers of parts, the only one of the range to being out of wood and not out of paperboard).

Complementary boxes, where these numbers were coupled with the suffix has, provided the complement of parts making it possible to pass from one limps with the following one. Thus the parts of the box n°2, supplemented that of the box 2A, on the whole provided the equivalent of a box number 3.

Three mechanical engines, the 1 to 1 direction of walk, the 1A with reverser of direction of walk, and small the Magic , was also sold separately. This last was also proposed in some units.

Several electrical motors under various tensions (of 3 with 220V) were also proposed, as well as a steam engine.

Today, the principal offer (Multi-models) is made up of numbered boxes from 2 to 50 (2-5-7-10-20-30-40-50) indicating the number of models in each box.

Models

The models can be built starting from plans and of existing notes, certain amateurs make really work of model makers by creating original models without plans nor notes.

Certain manufacturers are followers of the construction of Micro Models Meccano (MMM). The rules of the game consist in building a model whose parts necessary to the construction of the known as model place in the hollow of the hand.

Compatible systems and others

A great number of metal building sets using the modular approach were born during time: some strictly compatible and thus in imperial dimensions; others, completely incompatible, based on the metric system. Much disappeared, some still exist.

Among the compatible systems, one can quote Märklin (Germany), Amilac and Bral (Italy), Exacto (Argentinian), Gilbert Erector, The Constructioneer, American Builder (the USA).

Stabil (Germany) is partially compatible (axes diam 4mm, but distance between centres of 12,5 mm instead of 12,7).

And for the systems in metric dimensions:

Constructor (France) axes of 3 mm, distance between centres of 11 mm
Eitech (Germany) and Polylong are identical with axes of 4 mm and a distance between centres of 10 Misters Happy People (Germany) was added there at the beginning of 2007.
Merkur (Tchéchoslovaquie) uses axes of 3,5 mm, with a distance between centres of 10 mm
Trix (Germany and France) uses also axes of 3,5 Misters It is recognizable with its bored bands of 3 shifted lines of holes of 8 Misters

See too

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