So talented! I grew up (60's - 70's) always dreaming of getting a No10 set in its wooden box. I had a No 8 for Xmas 1968?, not sure what that would have cost in today's money, but I do remember a No10 being just over 50 pounds back then. Thanks for posting your block crane!
@@tresparivet6348 Thank you for your comments. I only made it up to about a set 6 back in the 60s. I didnt do any Meccano again for many many years until the early 1990s when my 6 year old had a set but wasnt greatly interested but I was! I was particularly surprised that at that time that the parts were still numbered the same after all those years. The Number 8 set is a good standard to get to, sadly the No10 was out of reach to all but the very wealthy. I understand if you wanted to buy one it would normally have to be made to order rather than a thing that even the factory had in stock. Sadly the No10 set is still a very expensive item, all second hand now, varying between £1000 and £2000 pounds depending on colour and condition. Thanks again for your comments.
50 GBP in 1968 is around 2200 GBP today adjusted for inflation. I don't know about Meccano, but the Czech Merkur, which is similar to Meccano (but uses metric sizes, it is a century old company) makes the same set of giant excavator, cca 18 kg, almost 40 pounds heavy, since the 1970s to this day. It is currently sold for 11K crowns, which is the equivalent of 500 Euro or 370 GBP. And it's still made in the same factory.
Very nice. Something all boys drooled over at the image on the cover, but of course were never able to get even close to building something as large as this. Thank you for showing this in real life!
Mecanno was intended for primary school age boys, age 6 onwards - 12 at most. When I was 6, a friend of my father gave me a large collection of used Mecanno parts - probably because his own children had out-grown Mecanno By the time I was 7, nearly 8, I was building tower cranes just like the one in this video. Just as big and just as complex. In my cranes I used the Mecanno ball race thrust bearing - from memory it was about 150 mm diameter and had rim teeth to take the Mecanno chain. I built lorries with fully functioning brakes (Bowden cable operated), steering, clutch, gearbox and differential too. Like Sanspareil, I found getting sufficient power a problem. I grew up on a farm, we didn't have electricity, and the Mecanno clockwork motor was completely inadequate. However, after a while my Mother bought me a Mammod model steam engine (these had mounting holes compatible with Mecanno) - this did have enough power output. By age 9/10 I had outgrown Mecanno and switched to building radios and other electronic devices. Boys up until the 1970's were a lot smarter mechanically than the later generations - I was in no way unique. The following generations were dumbed down by the pretty plastic Leggo. Their post war parents were more affluent and provided their children with a lot more variety in toys and activities. Also, after-school sports became a distraction away from non-team things you did yourself. So you are quite wrong - boys were indeed able to build things just like this. Old guys who build Mecanno are just like old guys who play with scale model electric train sets. Good on them for having fun, and for me at age 76 watching videos like this one is a quick bit of childhood nostalgia. But DO NOT think Mecanno was not a toy for small boys.
@@keithammleter3824 I never intended to hit a nerve, but meant that most of us never had the money to get enough Meccano to even come close to something as big as this. Certainly not in the 30's when my dad grew up. Apart from that, as far as I can recall, most boys (and girls for that) of say 6-8 were certainly not able or skilled to build something like this. You seem to be quite talented at construction and if you join others in this it may seem the whole world is as capable as you. I assure you on my part most people are not even close to your skills. That is simply my experience. So enjoy as do I and please let your experience be yours and mine mine.
@@pauldelcour : You did not hit a nerve. But I posted as I think you are wrong. In the 1930's, they were the depression years, and families could not afford to spend money on toys. But I was a small boy in the 1950's - they were the post-war boom years, and parents could afford Meccano. Also, being made mostly of mild steel and brass, it was very durable, and many kids got, as I did, a set of parts that some other kid had outgrown. In the 1950's, Meccano was very common. All the big city department stores had Meccano counters. As I recall, the axles/shafts could become bent if some 6 or 7 year old overloaded them with his weight, but most fathers could straighten them out. Forget girls. Until the 1980's, girls never much got involved in "boy's stuff". Interestingly, Lego seems today to be enjoyed by a fraction of girls and less so by boys. In the 1950's not ALL, but a large fraction of boys certainly could handle Meccano and build operable trucks and tower cranes. That was the generation of mechanically minded boys - just as boys today are hopeless at mechanics but know how to use iPads and mobile phones, and play computer games. The 1950's kids were the generation that often had a shed in the back yard they used as their "laboratory' in which their chemistry set knowledge was extended to make things go bang. I and most of my friends had a 'lab". Don't underestimate the brain of a child. Our intelligence peaks at about age 20. Fortunately experience compensates for the loss of IQ as we age. A 12 year old has about the same intelligence as a 60 year old. When personal computers became common in the 1980's, I conducted YMCA "computer camps" for children and pensioners. Most 6 year olds clearly learnt faster and could out-think anyone over 70. You only needed to show a 6 year old how to use Microsoft paint once. Half an hour later they show you pictures of rabbits and whatnot. Teaching a 70 year old, you had to explain the same things several times and some still wouldn't get it. I had one guy at work, only 60, who simply could not master using a mouse. The harder he tried, the madder he got, and the worse the result. We had to sack him. Yet to talk to he was quite normal. Disclaimer: I am now quite over 70.
@@keithammleter3824 Ha, that's so recognizable. Apart form IQ, could it not also be that kids are used to what they grow up with? Adjusting to quite new things has never been easy. I understand the basic of computers and use them all the time, but my wife will never understand the basics. She wants computers to think like she does, reveiling a major issue with a lot of apparatus: how user friendly they are or should be. Experience wise, I could not be a better music composer and arranger now than a long time ago, being now 63. I blame that to experience rather than IQ. We're a fascinating species at a time when technology changes at a higher rate than ever leaving behind more and more people it seems. We really need to be careful how we play this.
That is a marvellous piece of work - beautiful film. Some years ago I made one of these by combining the boom and upperworks of the pre-war No 10 - the one you've never seen made up - with the base from the post war model, because I thought the combination looked better. A lovely thing, if I wished to fully rotate the boom the model had to be very precisely positioned in the centre of our spare bedroom, to avoid striking the wall on either side. Yes, it was that big. My wife was very pleased / relieved when I took it down - and it came apart (sadly) a lot faster than it went together.
Thanks John. Yes getting a Block Setter to fully rotate needs a lot of space! I built this getting in for 20 years ago and havnt the heart to take it to bits! But, yes, they come apart much faster than they go together. I am surprised how much interest there is in this model this and also the tremendous interest in my Crawler Tractor elsewhere in this channel. But then Meccano is a wonderful toy which, sadly, has gone a bit out of fashion in recent years due to competition from construction sets beginning with L!
Had a Meccano set for a birthday present, fetched it from Coopers in Wollaston myself, always blame failing 11 plus on rushing off to get my Meccano. Yes, 11 plus on my birthday!
Thank you for doing this - it has given me some very useful tips for finishing my BSC, not least in using pulleys rather than flanged wheels on the circular girders which give too much play for the gear on the toothed quadrants (which I managed to find ‘new’!
Thank you for your comment and good luck with construction. Further detail can be found on the South West Meccano website southwestmeccano.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Block-Setter-detail.pdf
Thanks for the compliment. It’s far from perfect being a tad slower than prototype but I am quite pleased with it. I made it about 15 years ago from mainly resprayed pieces and just haven’t got the heart to dismantle it so it takes up quite a bit of space in the living room!
I think Meccano is can be more sophisticated for building large models. There are also not so many specialist parts in Meccano as there are in Lego so imagination and innovation plays a bigger part! Thanks for your comment.
It isn't so much that Mecanno is more sophisticated than Lego. You can get Lego parts that do what can't be done with Mecanno. But Mecanno parts are more generic, more fundamental, so building something out of Mecanno requires a lot more technical understanding of mechanisms, and considerably better imagination and ability to think. I very much believe that my experience with Mecanno as a small child is what led me to develop sufficient intelligence to go to university and become a professional engineer - the first in my extended family of farmers and farm hands to do so. Mecanno was conceived at a time when small boys constructed their own hill trolleys out of scrap wood and pram wheels, made their own slingshots and other weapons - things that are beyond what modern children can do. Modern toys are things that children just watch - their imagination and thinking is not tested. Lego is somewhere between, more on the "just watch" side. Mothers prefer their children to have Lego, because children are not frustrated as they can be when a Mecanno model doesn't work out. and because it is plastic and comes in pretty colours. Mecanno was just "industrial" green, red, and brass. When my generation attempted a Mecanno model a bit too ambitious and it didn't work, if he cried it was "tough it up, dopey - it's your own fault" - These days it is thought to be bad parenting to stress kids like that. When my generation (born 70 to 80 years ago) were children, we were praised for technical skill. Today, technical skill is somehow looked down upon.
@@keithammleter3824 hi only just noticed you comment for some reason. Whole heartedly agree. The scrap wood and pram wheel trollies (called Dobbins in this part of the world!) particularly resonates. Thanks for comment.
Very impressive. I love the levers in the engine house. I made the SM4 crane but not this one as I didn't have 125 3-hole angle girders, probably never will have!
Thanks for comments. I cut some No8s down to 9fs for some that were not so visible so cheated a bit! I made Sm4 several years back but while looking good found the gearbox struggled when transmitting power to the wheels.
A later GMM model instructions leaflet suggested using trunnions instead of the 1.5 inch angle girders. This would be on the upper part of the main boom sections where the whole assembly is a straight right angle. To prevent screw pull through when attaching the bracing strips/girders, washers can be used on the irregular holes of the trunnions.
I myself love mechano! The first time I got my first set of mechano it was from my school as a Christmas gift for the children AND I LOVED IT! Now I have tons of mechano but I don’t really make what’s on the box I like to make figures Is it hat that I don’t make what’s on the box?
@@davidterry2038 Yes I got hacked so had to remove it. It was only a short video. There is some more detail here though. southwestmeccano.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Block-Setter-detail.pdf
So talented! I grew up (60's - 70's) always dreaming of getting a No10 set in its wooden box. I had a No 8 for Xmas 1968?, not sure what that would have cost in today's money, but I do remember a No10 being just over 50 pounds back then. Thanks for posting your block crane!
@@tresparivet6348 Thank you for your comments. I only made it up to about a set 6 back in the 60s. I didnt do any Meccano again for many many years until the early 1990s when my 6 year old had a set but wasnt greatly interested but I was! I was particularly surprised that at that time that the parts were still numbered the same after all those years. The Number 8 set is a good standard to get to, sadly the No10 was out of reach to all but the very wealthy. I understand if you wanted to buy one it would normally have to be made to order rather than a thing that even the factory had in stock. Sadly the No10 set is still a very expensive item, all second hand now, varying between £1000 and £2000 pounds depending on colour and condition. Thanks again for your comments.
50 GBP in 1968 is around 2200 GBP today adjusted for inflation. I don't know about Meccano, but the Czech Merkur, which is similar to Meccano (but uses metric sizes, it is a century old company) makes the same set of giant excavator, cca 18 kg, almost 40 pounds heavy, since the 1970s to this day. It is currently sold for 11K crowns, which is the equivalent of 500 Euro or 370 GBP. And it's still made in the same factory.
Very nice. Something all boys drooled over at the image on the cover, but of course were never able to get even close to building something as large as this. Thank you for showing this in real life!
thanks for your comment. Its certainly an iconic model.
Mecanno was intended for primary school age boys, age 6 onwards - 12 at most. When I was 6, a friend of my father gave me a large collection of used Mecanno parts - probably because his own children had out-grown Mecanno
By the time I was 7, nearly 8, I was building tower cranes just like the one in this video. Just as big and just as complex. In my cranes I used the Mecanno ball race thrust bearing - from memory it was about 150 mm diameter and had rim teeth to take the Mecanno chain. I built lorries with fully functioning brakes (Bowden cable operated), steering, clutch, gearbox and differential too.
Like Sanspareil, I found getting sufficient power a problem. I grew up on a farm, we didn't have electricity, and the Mecanno clockwork motor was completely inadequate. However, after a while my Mother bought me a Mammod model steam engine (these had mounting holes compatible with Mecanno) - this did have enough power output.
By age 9/10 I had outgrown Mecanno and switched to building radios and other electronic devices.
Boys up until the 1970's were a lot smarter mechanically than the later generations - I was in no way unique. The following generations were dumbed down by the pretty plastic Leggo. Their post war parents were more affluent and provided their children with a lot more variety in toys and activities. Also, after-school sports became a distraction away from non-team things you did yourself.
So you are quite wrong - boys were indeed able to build things just like this.
Old guys who build Mecanno are just like old guys who play with scale model electric train sets. Good on them for having fun, and for me at age 76 watching videos like this one is a quick bit of childhood nostalgia. But DO NOT think Mecanno was not a toy for small boys.
@@keithammleter3824 I never intended to hit a nerve, but meant that most of us never had the money to get enough Meccano to even come close to something as big as this. Certainly not in the 30's when my dad grew up. Apart from that, as far as I can recall, most boys (and girls for that) of say 6-8 were certainly not able or skilled to build something like this. You seem to be quite talented at construction and if you join others in this it may seem the whole world is as capable as you. I assure you on my part most people are not even close to your skills. That is simply my experience.
So enjoy as do I and please let your experience be yours and mine mine.
@@pauldelcour : You did not hit a nerve. But I posted as I think you are wrong.
In the 1930's, they were the depression years, and families could not afford to spend money on toys. But I was a small boy in the 1950's - they were the post-war boom years, and parents could afford Meccano. Also, being made mostly of mild steel and brass, it was very durable, and many kids got, as I did, a set of parts that some other kid had outgrown.
In the 1950's, Meccano was very common. All the big city department stores had Meccano counters.
As I recall, the axles/shafts could become bent if some 6 or 7 year old overloaded them with his weight, but most fathers could straighten them out.
Forget girls. Until the 1980's, girls never much got involved in "boy's stuff".
Interestingly, Lego seems today to be enjoyed by a fraction of girls and less so by boys.
In the 1950's not ALL, but a large fraction of boys certainly could handle Meccano and build operable trucks and tower cranes. That was the generation of mechanically minded boys - just as boys today are hopeless at mechanics but know how to use iPads and mobile phones, and play computer games.
The 1950's kids were the generation that often had a shed in the back yard they used as their "laboratory' in which their chemistry set knowledge was extended to make things go bang. I and most of my friends had a 'lab".
Don't underestimate the brain of a child. Our intelligence peaks at about age 20. Fortunately experience compensates for the loss of IQ as we age. A 12 year old has about the same intelligence as a 60 year old.
When personal computers became common in the 1980's, I conducted YMCA "computer camps" for children and pensioners. Most 6 year olds clearly learnt faster and could out-think anyone over 70. You only needed to show a 6 year old how to use Microsoft paint once. Half an hour later they show you pictures of rabbits and whatnot. Teaching a 70 year old, you had to explain the same things several times and some still wouldn't get it. I had one guy at work, only 60, who simply could not master using a mouse. The harder he tried, the madder he got, and the worse the result. We had to sack him. Yet to talk to he was quite normal.
Disclaimer: I am now quite over 70.
@@keithammleter3824 Ha, that's so recognizable. Apart form IQ, could it not also be that kids are used to what they grow up with? Adjusting to quite new things has never been easy. I understand the basic of computers and use them all the time, but my wife will never understand the basics. She wants computers to think like she does, reveiling a major issue with a lot of apparatus: how user friendly they are or should be.
Experience wise, I could not be a better music composer and arranger now than a long time ago, being now 63. I blame that to experience rather than IQ.
We're a fascinating species at a time when technology changes at a higher rate than ever leaving behind more and more people it seems. We really need to be careful how we play this.
Ein starkes Stück. Danke für's Zeigen
Thank you for your comment.
Beautiful. My dream back around ‘62 to have this. Still have an original catalogue with this on front cover.
Thank you.
An absolutely super model, I love it. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you. Please feel free to check out the other Meccano models on my channel.
That is a marvellous piece of work - beautiful film. Some years ago I made one of these by combining the boom and upperworks of the pre-war No 10 - the one you've never seen made up - with the base from the post war model, because I thought the combination looked better. A lovely thing, if I wished to fully rotate the boom the model had to be very precisely positioned in the centre of our spare bedroom, to avoid striking the wall on either side. Yes, it was that big. My wife was very pleased / relieved when I took it down - and it came apart (sadly) a lot faster than it went together.
Thanks John. Yes getting a Block Setter to fully rotate needs a lot of space! I built this getting in for 20 years ago and havnt the heart to take it to bits! But, yes, they come apart much faster than they go together. I am surprised how much interest there is in this model this and also the tremendous interest in my Crawler Tractor elsewhere in this channel. But then Meccano is a wonderful toy which, sadly, has gone a bit out of fashion in recent years due to competition from construction sets beginning with L!
Had a Meccano set for a birthday present, fetched it from Coopers in Wollaston myself, always blame failing 11 plus on rushing off to get my Meccano. Yes, 11 plus on my birthday!
Thank you for doing this - it has given me some very useful tips for finishing my BSC, not least in using pulleys rather than flanged wheels on the circular girders which give too much play for the gear on the toothed quadrants (which I managed to find ‘new’!
Thank you for your comment and good luck with construction. Further detail can be found on the South West Meccano website southwestmeccano.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Block-Setter-detail.pdf
Very impressive. It's kind of like climbing Everest for a Meccanoman to make one of these!
Thank you. I tried a couple of the official Meccano plans before settling on this one. No plans to dismantle it.
Hi sr you are genius and talent glad to see your work continue
Thank you for your kind comment
One of the best, I've seen 👍
Thanks for the compliment. It’s far from perfect being a tad slower than prototype but I am quite pleased with it. I made it about 15 years ago from mainly resprayed pieces and just haven’t got the heart to dismantle it so it takes up quite a bit of space in the living room!
exactly !
Mecanno looks far more sophisticated than Lego
I think Meccano is can be more sophisticated for building large models. There are also not so many specialist parts in Meccano as there are in Lego so imagination and innovation plays a bigger part! Thanks for your comment.
It isn't so much that Mecanno is more sophisticated than Lego. You can get Lego parts that do what can't be done with Mecanno.
But Mecanno parts are more generic, more fundamental, so building something out of Mecanno requires a lot more technical understanding of mechanisms, and considerably better imagination and ability to think. I very much believe that my experience with Mecanno as a small child is what led me to develop sufficient intelligence to go to university and become a professional engineer - the first in my extended family of farmers and farm hands to do so.
Mecanno was conceived at a time when small boys constructed their own hill trolleys out of scrap wood and pram wheels, made their own slingshots and other weapons - things that are beyond what modern children can do.
Modern toys are things that children just watch - their imagination and thinking is not tested. Lego is somewhere between, more on the "just watch" side. Mothers prefer their children to have Lego, because children are not frustrated as they can be when a Mecanno model doesn't work out. and because it is plastic and comes in pretty colours. Mecanno was just "industrial" green, red, and brass.
When my generation attempted a Mecanno model a bit too ambitious and it didn't work, if he cried it was "tough it up, dopey - it's your own fault" - These days it is thought to be bad parenting to stress kids like that.
When my generation (born 70 to 80 years ago) were children, we were praised for technical skill. Today, technical skill is somehow looked down upon.
@@keithammleter3824 hi only just noticed you comment for some reason. Whole heartedly agree. The scrap wood and pram wheel trollies (called Dobbins in this part of the world!) particularly resonates. Thanks for comment.
Very impressive. I love the levers in the engine house. I made the SM4 crane but not this one as I didn't have 125 3-hole angle girders, probably never will have!
Thanks for comments. I cut some No8s down to 9fs for some that were not so visible so cheated a bit! I made Sm4 several years back but while looking good found the gearbox struggled when transmitting power to the wheels.
A later GMM model instructions leaflet suggested using trunnions instead of the 1.5 inch angle girders. This would be on the upper part of the main boom sections where the whole assembly is a straight right angle. To prevent screw pull through when attaching the bracing strips/girders, washers can be used on the irregular holes of the trunnions.
@@robertneill3057 yes that could be a good solution.
wow beautiful build
Thank you
I myself love mechano! The first time I got my first set of mechano it was from my school as a Christmas gift for the children AND I LOVED IT! Now I have tons of mechano but I don’t really make what’s on the box I like to make figures
Is it hat that I don’t make what’s on the box?
looking at 9:10 topleft, the inner forkpieces must be aligned. On the topright it's correct. Same goes for 11:56. Great vid.
Yes you are correct-well spotted! They have been corrected since the video was made.
Hiya, you refer to an earlier video about your GBSC.....I can't find that, did you remove it?
@@davidterry2038 Yes I got hacked so had to remove it. It was only a short video. There is some more detail here though. southwestmeccano.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Block-Setter-detail.pdf
Wow!
Hornby Dublo switch gear