Our Young Engineer recently rebuilt the cover of a “vintage” drawing kit, with fabric pockets for protractors & scales and real leather hinges, thereby raising a long-procrastinated project to the top of my to-do list:
I know my father used it when he took drafting after high school in 1929. His penmanship and drawing ability were up to par well before that.
The inside sports a TEC logo:
Some searching revealed it’s a No. 718 Drafting Set from the Technical Supply Company of Scranton and appeared in their 1913 catalog:
The printing on the inside of the flap differs, but the logo has TEC in the middle.
My father did not attend college and, in the teeth of The Great Depression, $26.50 was certainly too spendy for his family:
When the catalog was printed in 1913, No. 718 cost the equivalent of $862.82. Nowadays, similar sets once again cost about twenty bucks on eBay, which tells you something about economics.
None of that information changes what I know.
Having recently touched a roll of Kraft-Tex while shelving some boxes, this seemed reasonable:
It lacks pockets for the tools I’ve added:
In retrospect, I should have used two leather snaps, but three would be excessive.
I folded the Kraft-Tex flat across a steel scale to make the first folds around the base, then finger-crimped folds at the top of the base with subsequent crisping around the scale:
The underside of the original case seemed stable:
This may be sacrilege, but I saw no point in peeling the bottom just to cover it up,so I stuck the Kraft-Tex in place with a rectangle of adhesive sheet.
It doesn’t look the same, but it still gives me a warm feeling.
It still has the tiny wrench needed to adjust all its screws:
It’s on 0.1 inch graph paper and is 40 mil = 1 mm thick, should you want to make your own. The blades taper down to essentially a knife edge, which is why it’s made from hard blue steel.
I remember being fascinated by that little pig when I was a pup.
Putting some scraps to good use, I stuck a cushion in the anvil for the next time I punch down a leather snap:
The LightBurn SVG layout as a GitHub Gist:
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 
Comments
9 responses to “TEC Drawing Kit: Reconditioned Cover”
That’s a lovely drawing set. Reminds me a lot of the Riefler set from ~1930 I inherited from my grandfather and used through university. Your TEC set likely has fluted legs on the larger instruments due to a patent held by Riefler on round-legged designs.
Unfortunately, I didn’t pick up my grandfather’s drawing skills. His were more a family thing, as his father was the professor of mechanical engineering at the Royal Technical College in Glasgow.
The (screw-top!) metal tube over on the right has four pieces of 2 mm lead, so either Dad restocked the supply or everything I think I know is wrong.
Just checked and, hey, 2 mm “compass lead” is still a thing: draw All The Circles forever! :grin:
I have a similar set, though I don’t believe all the pieces are there. Not sure I ever did a mechanical drawing with ink, with my previous efforts done in pencil. I thought it had been my grandfather’s (carpenter, later a general contractor), though it could have been my Dad’s. Far too late to get answers now. The pieces look very familiar; will have to see if any trademarks show.
2mm leads are close enough to 5/64s, which might possibly [be/have been] a standard size.
That is sofa king awesome. I love the old tools and love the renewed case. Well done.
I have the same set with a different layout (probably different years produced) yhat was my father in-lawxs, but I’m missing the little tool that’s in the bottom right of your set. Would it be possible to get a picture or two of it? I havent found what it looks like anywhere!
It’s the cutest little blue-steel pig you’ve ever seen! :grin:
A scaled picture and description are now in the post …
Thanks! My set doesn’t have the gap adjustments so maybe it was a leg-less pig in my case.
Would those bow pens be any good in your pen plotter?
The one time I tried using those pens convinced me that I have absolutely no aptitude for pen-and-ink drawing. I’d expect the plotter to be even worse at it than I am, even if I could figure out how to mount the pens and supply them with ink.
Sad, but true. :grin: