Computer built from Meccano in 1934

Cory Doctorow 3:49 pm Sun Jul 15, 2007

A Differential Analyser — a specialised computer — made from Meccano is on display as part of a show on "Machines that Count" at the Museum of Transport and Technology in Auckland, NZ:

That machine was bought for £100 and came to New Zealand around 1950. Ironically, it was used to build the Benmore Hydro Dam and by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, to calculate rabbit populations. It then languished for years at Wellington Polytechnic before finding its way to the Museum of Transport and Technology in the 1970s, where it has been restored and is on display as a lead exhibit in the museum’s “Machines that Count” exhibition.

MOTAT’s Differential Analyser was built by J B Bratt at Cambridge University in 1935, largely from Meccano components. It is known as Meccano Differential Analyser No. 2.

“When New Zealand had two computers, that was one of them,” Pratt says of the System 360 on display. The machine is one of Pratt’s favourites, along with the Macintosh IIfx, which he describes as “blisteringly fast”.

Link to Computerworld article, Link to The Differential Analyser Explained

(Thanks, Rob!)

See also:
HOWTO protect your Meccano in a divorce
3D printer made from Meccano and hot-glue

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