The Rapid Collapse of the Swedish Mechanical Calculator Industry

[Luigi Vampa]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJPMIjVGzd0

Hope you like it.

[Dan C]

Nice video!

FACIT was in my country Sweden, at the town Åtvidaberg!
They really never managed to switch to electronic calculators, and therefor dissapeard

[bbergman]

Cool, interesting history. Thanks!

[johanw]

(10-03-2022 02:57 PM)Dan C Wrote:  Nice video!

FACIT was in my country Sweden, at the town Åtvidaberg!
They really never managed to switch to electronic calculators, and therefor dissapeard

Funny how completely different that worked out for the watch industry. First the Swiss watch industry is almost destroyed when the quarts movements are developed (lookup "quartz crisis" for more information), and now they manage to sell mechanical watches, who are in almost al, user aspects inferior to quartz watches (quartz is far more accurate, much cheaper to produce, much less fragile), for premium prices and make huge profits.

[johnb]

(10-03-2022 08:05 PM)johanw Wrote:  Funny how completely different that worked out for the watch industry. First the Swiss watch industry is almost destroyed when the quarts movements are developed (lookup "quartz crisis" for more information), and now they manage to sell mechanical watches, who are in almost al, user aspects inferior to quartz watches (quartz is far more accurate, much cheaper to produce, much less fragile), for premium prices and make huge profits.

It's not quite as odd as it sounds.

Among watch collectors, a well-made "automatic" (that is, a mechanical self-winder) is a thing of joy and beauty. So, while my $50 Casio quartz-electronic has more functions and keeps better time, I get more enjoyment out of my automatics.

Which makes me realize how fortunate we are as HP collector/users, compared to some other collectors! A vintage HP calculator is not only much nicer to use than anything built since (SwissMicros excluded), but we also have the advantage that they are generally better tools than the newer stuff.


regards,
--johnb

[johanw]

(10-03-2022 10:42 PM)johnb Wrote:  Among watch collectors, a well-made "automatic" (that is, a mechanical self-winder) is a thing of joy and beauty. So, while my $50 Casio quartz-electronic has more functions and keeps better time, I get more enjoyment out of my automatics.

I understand. I usually wear a $50 quartz, but I've now bought a $150 Seiko automatic just to look at the mechanism (it has a glass bottom). Unfortunately this one doesn't stop the second hand when you set the time and can't be wind manually, but apart from that it is a pleasure to look at the mechanism.

Quote:Which makes me realize how fortunate we are as HP collector/users, compared to some other collectors! A vintage HP calculator is not only much nicer to use that anything built since (SwissMicros excluded), but we also have the advantage that they are generally better tools than the newer stuff.

And don't forget much cheaper... A rare HP in pristine condition can be expensive but nowhere near the price of a vintage or new Rolex, IWC or Breitling.

[johnb]

(10-04-2022 02:02 PM)johanw Wrote:  And don't forget much cheaper... A rare HP in pristine condition can be expensive but nowhere near the price of a vintage or new Rolex, IWC or Breitling.

Hmm... I can go on 12-15 different camping trips with my wife, or I can buy a Breitling N01. Decisions, decisions...

[Maximilian Hohmann]

Hello!

(10-03-2022 08:05 PM)johanw Wrote:  Funny how completely different that worked out for the watch industry. First the Swiss watch industry is almost destroyed when the quarts movements are developed (lookup "quartz crisis" for more information), and now they manage to sell mechanical watches, who are in almost al, user aspects inferior to quartz watches (quartz is far more accurate, much cheaper to produce, much less fragile), for premium prices and make huge profits.

The Swiss watch industry was saved by a single person who must have been one of the great visionary geniuses of the 20th century. He could have saved every industry, including the one making Swedish calculators, but he happended to live in Switzerland and was more interested in watches than in calculators.
I was somewhere in Italy (Bologna it was, I will never forget!) having lunch with a Swiss colleague when we saw his death announced on a TV set that was running silently in the restaurant. My colleague, a fully grown up person and at that time was working as commercial pilot, almost (or rather really) broke out in tears when he read the news. Only then I realised how much Nicolas Hayek had done for the Swiss watch industry and for the Swiss ego in general.

(10-03-2022 08:05 PM)johanw Wrote:  A vintage HP calculator is not only much nicer to use that anything built since (SwissMicros excluded), but we also have the advantage that they are generally better tools than the newer stuff.

I do not concur. A tool is something that you need at work and which you must be able to rely on to some degree. But it is not a precious sacred thing that must be made in a way to live forever. It must come with a price tag that will allow you to generate a net positive income from your work. If all your workforce is required to pay off your tools then you better stop working and collect calculators instead. Therefore for me, should I ever use a calculator to generate income (will probably not happen...) a cheap Casio or Ti from a stationary shop is a much more useful tool than one of those HPs from the 1970ies or early 1980ies that cost as much as a monthly income.

And none of those ridicuosly expensive watches can ever be a tool because people who need that kind of tool (nobody does, anyway...) will not be able to afford one. These watches are nothing but pieces of jewelry and usually spend most of, or all of, their time in a bank safe.
And the same was true for Swedish calculating machines and HP calculators throughout the 1970ies, at least in my part of the world, namley central Europe. Without Texas Instruments I would not have been able to own and use a powerful calculator at school and universitry and without Swatch I would not be able a to wear a pretty, precise and dependable Swiss watch.
Or to afford the hobby of collecting watches :-) My Swatch collection has not yet outgrown my calculator collection in numbers, but by now I must at least have more Swatches than calculatos from HP.

Who knows, maybe one day Swiss Micros will be to the (HP) calculator industry what Swatch is to the watch industry?

Regards
Max

[johnb]

(10-04-2022 07:16 PM)Maximilian Hohmann Wrote:  

(10-03-2022 08:05 PM)johanw Wrote:  A vintage HP calculator is not only much nicer to use that anything built since (SwissMicros excluded), but we also have the advantage that they are generally better tools than the newer stuff.

I do not concur. A tool is something that you need at work and which you must be able to rely on to some degree. But it is not a precious sacred thing that must be made in a way to live forever. It must come with a price tag that will allow you to generate a net positive income from your work.

Apologies to poor Johan for being mistaken for me; the second quote was actually mine!

First off, I think you and I agree more than we disagree. The reason I collect HP calculators in the first place is that I could see they were superior to other calculators in the 1970's - 1990's, but I could not afford one until prices for the basic units dropped to about $80. Some guys get the red sports car when they finally make it; I got a collection of HPs! LOL!

But about it being a precious [but not sacred] thing. Certain works of craftmanship come along only once. Theatre Organs (another of my hobbies) were largely built only in the 1915-1929 time frame, and only in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia (& maybe New Zealand). They were an economical alternative to an orchestra to accompany silent films. Once "talkies" arrived, they were a curiosity. But they are a REMARKABLE curiosity: they're a full-blown synthesizer built from nothing more than circa-1900 electropneumatic technology.

So there are those of us who labor diligently to save the few remaining Theatre Organs in the world, preventing them from being carelessly demolished (not always successfully), and restoring them to their former glory so that future generations can enjoy them and be astonished at "what we once did with only string and baling wire."

I view restoring and preserving HP calculators (and other engineering accoutrements, such as the Curta) in the same light. "These were once so hugely expensive such that few could buy them, but they were engineered better than all the rest of the competition." It's why it upsets me to hear that someone tossed their old 42 or 32sII just because they thought it didn't work, or they didn't need it any more. It's why it angers me that some opportunists are taking hacksaws to beautiful mint-condition Curtas to produce fakes of the coveted "cutaway sales models."

Whew. But, yeah, you have to be able to afford a thing in order to have the thing to use!!

--johnb

[johnb]

Max:

I almost forgot to thank you for posting about the man who saved the Swiss watch industry.

I had to go right away and research what you were talking about.

Amazing!

--johnb

[Jim Horn]

I learned about automatic watches a few years ago and was immediately impressed. But, being entirely mechanical, their actual accuracy is far less than quartz movement watches. So I looked for the best of both and settled for the Seiko Kinetic series as an acceptable compromise between performance, robustness and price. Further, I found an non-operating one on a Goodwill auction which I won for US$39. By purchasing a watch tool set and a replacement rechargeable "power cell", I soon had it working fine for a total out-of-pocket $105 compared to a new price of over $400. It has served me well now for years with a drift rate of under 200ms per day. No battery to replace ever and it does have the windowed back along with 100M waterproofness. Ganz schön!

[Namir]

The better is the enemy of the good -- Voltaire

[BobVA]

(10-05-2022 11:27 PM)Jim Horn Wrote:  ...So I looked for the best of both and settled for the Seiko Kinetic series as an acceptable compromise between performance, robustness and price...

Seiko released the "Spring Drive" movement a few years ago that's interesting as well. Like the Kinetic it's a hybrid electronic / mechanical self-powered movement, but it edges further towards the mechanical, being powered by a traditional mainspring / gear train that's regulated with an electromagnetic brake instead of balance wheel.