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Welcome to Tim Robinson's

Computing Machinery web site

I've always been fascinated by Meccano, almost exclusively with mechanism and models the "do something real." Unfortunately, I never retained photographic records of many of the machines from my youth, but I recall astronomical clocks, orreries, looms and other textile machinery, a gear cutting machine (which cut usable gears in brass), and perhaps most enduring, the differential analyzer (an analog computer).

This latter has been a lifelong interest and rarely has been the time I have not had some variant assembled. Most recently, having fully conquered the challenge of the differential analyzer, I became interested in the Difference and Analytical Engines of Charles Babbage (pioneering attempts to build mechanical digital computers in the 19th century). Having completed a working models of the difference engines, and after several discussion threads of these machines on the Spanner email group, I'm finally getting round to documenting these on this web site.

LINKS:
    Site Map
    Babbage's difference engines - historical and mathematical background
         Robinson's difference engine #1
         Robinson's difference engine #2
    Babbage's analytical engine
    Differential analyzers - historical background
        Details of my Meccano differential analyzer
    Decimal Counter
    Bibliography

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Last modified: 24 February 2008
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