Chris Aldrich Blog: BoffoSocko.com

Replacing the Body Shell Rubber Bushings on an Olympia SG1 Typewriter

Over the weekend I made a major push on beginning restoration of the Olympia SG1 standard typewriter I picked up this past month.

One of the small issues I encountered was finding four crushed rubber bushings between the exterior typewriter shell and the main chassis at the four corners on the bottom of the machine.

View of the back corner underneath an Olympia SG1 typewriter featuring a crushed rubber washer between the body shell and the solid steel chassis of the typewriter. It look like it's less than a millimeter thick. — This black rubber bushing is so smashed you almost can’t see it above the silver screw head at the bottom of the typewriter frame. The typewriter’s foot has been removed from the vacant screw hole just to the left of the bushing screw to provide better visibility.

This is a common repair issue for the Olympia SM3 machines and one which can dramatically impair that typewriter’s functionality after several decades. I expected this would be a common enough problem, so I searched a few fora, YouTube, and some specialty Facebook Groups to see how others had done the replacement and find the specs for the original part. Sadly none were forthcoming. Has no one written this up before? Perhaps because the issue isn’t a huge problem from a functional perspective, no one has bothered?

But when you’re doing a thorough restoration on a machine you plan to put into daily use, you go the extra mile. To that end, I thought I’d write up a few notes for those who encounter this in the future, particularly as I couldn’t find quick sources on it the way one can for the SM3.

My crushed rubber husks (now more like a brittle, friable plastic) were approximately 16mmOD x 4mm ID x 2 mm, but I wanted to do better than guessing the appropriate replacement. Fortunately our friend Richard Polt has a downloadable .pdf copy of the Olympia Spare Parts Catalog and Price List for Standard Typewriters Model SG1 (Jan. 1, 1961 edition) from the Ames Supply Company on his website. Pulling it up very quickly provided a diagram of the appropriate part on page 12 and indicated it to be part number 34280-5x.6. Scrolling ahead to page 61, one discovers that the part is called a “spacing washer (rubber)” whose original specs are listed as 5⌀12⌀x4mm which originally listed for 11¢. On a German manufactured machine this is indicating a 5mm inner diameter, 12 mm outer diameter, and thickness of 4mm.

A quick spin over to the local Ace Hardware store and I was able to find a variety of Hillman rubber bushings on offer as potential replacements.

I selected Hillman part number 405784-E as the closest bushing with dimensions 1/4″ overall length; 3/16″ ID, 9/16″ major dia.; 3/8″ min. dia. and 1/8″ Hd. thickness. I picked up 4 of them for $0.95 each. Depending on availability, others might find luck ordering something of similar size and dimension from purveyors like McMaster-Carr or Grainger.

Comparison of the old bushings on the left with the new rubber bushings on the right separated by the shoulder bolts and washers in the middle. — The old (left) and the new (right).

Back at home I inserted the smaller end into the hole of the frame and screwed the shoulder bolt and washer back in to hold the frame onto the typewriter chassis. It seemed an excellent fit and this part of the machine should be in good shape for the next few decades.

If this is the only repair you’re making to your machine, I suggest you replace each one, one-at-a-time in turn. This will prevent you from needing to take apart more of the machine or removing the entire body shell to get them on and will speed up the replacement process. If you’re doing it as a larger restoration, then just install them when you re-attach the body shell. For me, loosely attaching the two rear ones followed by the two at the front and then tightening/adjusting them all seemed to be the easier way to go.

If you’re restoring your own SG1, I hope these details make your work and research a bit quicker and easier.

The Deluxe Steelcase Field Notes Notebooks Archive

This nearly indestructible black and gray powder-coated 20 gauge steel constructed 8 drawer cabinet with art deco flourishes has 36 linear feet of storage space for over 2,000 Field Notes notebooks.

This is enough space for over 83 years’ worth of subscription to the quarterly notebooks. Literally enough space for a lifetime of notes.

Staple Day, eat your heart out! We’re stalking down the elusive 4 Drawer Day!

Rubber Grommet Repair on Remington Super-Riters and Standards

As rubber replacement is one of the necessary and sometimes more finnicky parts of typewriter restoration, I thought it would be useful to write up the details of a small recent repair for others as well as my future self.

Late last May, I did a full clean, oil, and adjust (COA) on my 1951 Remington Super-Riter . One of the few restorations steps I didn’t carry out at the time was the replacement of the rubber grommets on the two side panels and the rear panel. The rubber was so hard and brittle on most of them that they crumbled off leaving only the brass inserts. Some of them also left a sludgy black residue on the metal.

Two rows of rubber grommets and brass eyelets. — The top left is an original brass eyelet/new rubber grommet assembly next to three new rubber grommets. The bottom row features a desiccated rubber grommet next to three original brass eyelets.

This weekend, I went foraging at the local Ace Hardware store to find some replacements for the originals.

I took a reasonable guess and for 27 cents each I picked up six grommets which were the perfect size. If you’re in the market for your own replacement rubber grommets, they were Hillman part number 55051-A with the following specifications: ID: 1/8″; OD: 11/32″; Thickness: 3/16″; Grove Diameter: 1/4″; Groove width: 1/16″ .

When I went to install them, I discovered that I was able to wiggle them into the holes in the side panels. I could also get the brass grommets back in with a bit of work. However, I couldn’t discern for the life of me why they included the brass grommets from an engineering perspective. Leaving them off seems to allow a nice friction fit of the panels on the appropriate metal pins against the rubber. Further, without the brass grommets one seems to get not only a better fit, but the vibration dampening of the panels seems to work better. I also suspect the grommet life of the rubber will be better this way in the long run.

I notice that my later 1956 Remington Standard has a similar design for the side and rear panels, but in that case they’d switched to a single center pin and put two bare rubber grommets on each side of it, choosing to leave off the brass internal eyelets by this time—apparently they came to the same conclusion I had. This means that this same rubber grommet repair can be done on a variety of Remington standard typewriters made after World War II.

Editor’s Note: If you’re cleaning or repairing your own Remington Standard from this era, be sure to check and see if it’s got the Fold-A-Matic feature for making your job much easier.

If for historical or consistency reasons, you insist on the brass gromets as part of the repair of your personal machine, you can certainly manage to use the originals with some care, however, if you’ve got your own eyelet tool (which many typewriter repair people may have for inserting eyelets into ribbon for the auto-reverse functionality of Smith-Corona typewriters) you can use it in combination with new 3/16″ (or slightly smaller) metal eyelets to more permanently seat your rubber grommets into your metal panels.

Have you tried this restoration trick before? What did you use for replacements?

Close up of an index card in a typewriter carriage which reads: "Kathleen, you are a lone reed, standing tall, waving boldly in the corrupt sands of commerce." -Frank Navasky | You've Got Mail (Warner Bros., 1998) | as typed on his Olympia Report De Luxe Electric. In the background is a wooden dresser with a large screen television which has a somewhat blurry image of Greg Kinnear sitting at his typewriter from the movie.

Wished for LEGO Peanuts: Snoopy's Doghouse (LEGO)

“Dogs’ lives don’t have to have meaning.” Inspire memories of witty Snoopy sayings and bring classic comic scenes to life with LEGO® Ideas Peanuts: Snoopy’s Doghouse (21368). This model building kit for adults features a posable Snoopy figure which comes with 2 alternative leg builds for sitting and standing and 2 neck positions for lying down and standing. Display him lying on top of his house with his friend Woodstock on his belly, sitting up typing on his LEGO typewriter or in standing poses. The interior walls of the doghouse can be folded out to create a starry night sky, the perfect backdrop for Snoopy and Woodstock to ’toast’ marshmallows on the campfire A delightful gift for Peanuts comic lovers and Snoopy merch collectors, the set offers a fun way to create your own nostalgic home decor. And you can enjoy enhanced building with the LEGO® Builder app, zooming and rotating with 3D instructions, while saving and tracking progress. Set contains 964 pieces.

My birthday is in July, just after this new LEGO set is released…

Book Club: César Hidalgo’s The Infinite Alphabet and the Las of Knowledge

Coming up for the next few weeks, the Dan Allosso Book Club will focus on Cesar Hidalgo’s new book, out this month in the United States:

Hidalgo, César A. 2026. The Infinite Alphabet: And the Laws of Knowledge. New York: Penguin.

The first session will be on Saturday, February 21, 2026, and will recur weekly from 8:00 AM – 10:00 Pacific. Our meetings are welcoming and casual conversations over Zoom with the optional beverage of your choice. We’ll cover the first two parts in the first meeting.

To join and get access to the Zoom links and the shared Obsidian vault we use for notes and community communication, ping Dan Allosso with your email address.

Happy reading!

Acquired 1954 Royal HH Standard Typewriter (Royal Typewriter Company)

S/N: HHS-5406732
Royal Pica Double Gothic typeface
10 characters per inch; 6 lines per inch; U.S. keyboard, 43 keys, 86 characters

Acquired via thrift on 2026-02-06. This machine continues my typewriter collection theme for 2026: hunting for great machines with less common typefaces. Gothic was an older word meaning san-serif. The “double” portion means that it’s two sets of capital letter forms.

(Sorry James…)

Capital white gothic letters typed onto a platen read: "CHRIS WAS HERE" — The white correction tape message typed (assuredly not by me!!) onto the platen was a sure sign this thrifted typewriter was destined for my collection.

After my note earlier about progress on restoring my 1936 Royal KHM typewriter, a colleague reminded me that a KHM makes an appearance in the Taylor Swift song Fortnight. Then they asked if I was just collecting machines from her videos? While I fully expect to pick up a Royal Ten one day, it’s a total coincidence. She’s obviously got great taste in vintage typing machines.

Acquired 1956 Olympia SG1 Standard Typewriter by Olympia Werke AG (Wilhelmshave, Germany)

Serial number: 7-139497 (body), 8-178336 (carriage);
Congress Elite No. 84 typeface, 11CPI, 2.3m/m pitch, 46 keys, 92 characters
bichrome+, tabulator, paper injector, line spacing: 1, 1 1/2, 2, 2 1/2, 3; spaced typing;

2026-01-31 Acquired at thrift for a very reasonable $70. I was really hoping to get a Modern Elite No. 66 or an Elite No. 8 as my first SG1, but finding this with a Congress Elite No. 84 typeface was a reasonably acceptable alternative, particularly in usable condition.

Initial condition assessment

This 70 year old standard typewriter is in reasonable condition, but will require a full clean/oil/adjust as well as the following repairs:

left shift key broken off and key lever bent
blow out old desiccated foam
5-6 sticky keys; remainder are slower than they ought to be
broken paper support (surprise!)
de-rust some of the internals
replace ribbon and poorly matched spools
recover platen
carriage grinding on return
new feet (old, hard, chipping)
replace foam with new felt
the aligning scales for the Perspex card holders aren’t functioning properly (broken or missing a spring?)
polish keys and spacebar
brights all need attention and polishing

Repairs on 2026-02-02

With some of the quick repairs listed below, I’ve got this machine up to the level of pretty good acceptable daily use condition. It’ll definitely be a serious member of the rotation once the C/O/A is finished. If it had a more standard typeface it might have a shot at replacing my elite Royal KMG.

basic wipe down of dirt, dust, etc.
fixed carriage grinding on return
replaced spools and ribbon with nylon blue/green
blew out old foam as well as other internal dust and cobwebs
basic cleanout of segment to get keys unstuck and working well enough
basic oiling of carriage rails and one or two additional spots

Typesample and Slugs

Olympia SG1 Typewriter Manual

My machine didn’t come with a manual—standard typewriters without protective cases rarely ever do. If you happen to need one for yours, Richard Polt has one in his collection: Olympia SG1 Super De Luxe Operating Instructions

General Comments

As someone who uses a lot of index cards, this seems a spectacular machine. My one immediate issue is that I wish the paper injector went down a few more notches as I have to roll it back up a few lines to get to an acceptable starting line on my index card.

Grand Opening of Typewriter Muse

For about 7 years Typewriter Muse has been operating out of a home-like space, but this weekend they opened a lovely brick and mortar location in Riverside, CA in a nice sized business park with plenty of Doris Day parking right out front.

Their Instagram account has been documenting some of the move and set up over the past month, but Bob and the gang have unveiled their new space on Saturday, January 31, 2026.

Bob’s shop is one of the few I’m aware of with a multitude of people (at least six by my count on Saturday) working at any given time. (Most modern shops are one or possibly two person operations.) This means that the cleaning, repairs, oiling, and adjusting can be set up in an assembly line fashion. Machines come into the front of the shop on the left hand side, then move down the left to the rear where they do power washing and platen work in the back room. From there they move back into the main portion of the shop where the segments and internals are cleaned using isopropyl alcohol and long stick q-tips. (This generally means less health and safety issues by not using mineral spirits, lacquer thinner, or other caustic chemicals which require better ventilation.) From there they stage on a long desk before they go to one of two mechanic’s stations where repairs and adjustments are made before being stored for pick up or placed in the “showroom” The overall layout is quite well designed for moving machines in and out of the shop.

Unique for many shops, the front reception space has community room for a handful of small desks and typewriters to accommodate 8-10 people for small classes, demonstrations, or a small type-in. The room has been dedicated to local journalist Dan Bernstein. (If you’re in the So-Cal area and are interested, Bob has kindly offered the writing space for small type-in events.)

I drove out in the late morning from Altadena. As a typewriter enthusiast I naturally chose the apropos 71 S Corona route (California State Route 71 towards Corona) before turning off toward Riverside, which is about an hour from my house near Pasadena.

Five lane highway featuring a massive sign over the road announcing the split between the 71 South to Corona and the 60 East to Riverside. — Who’d have thought the great typewriters were in Riverside and not in Corona?

Bob Marshall and Bryan Mahoney discussing a custom painted Royal P.

Typewriter Muse's typewriter showroom with 4 wire shelving units covered with about two dozen typewriters of various makes and models. Underneath the shelving is a row of typewriter cases. On the side of the room opposite the shelving is a table with space for three typewriters for typing tests. — Try out a machine or twenty while you’re here!

Rest in Peace: Typewriter Repair Legend Duane Jensen (August 21, 1961-January 25,2026)

Just a few hours ago, Faye shared some sad news.

Most of us might only be able to recognize his voice, his patient hands, and his preference for lacquer thinner, but all of us are richer in typewriter knowledge because of Duane Jensen’s kind sharing of his craft by way of his spectacularly helpful Phoenix Typewriter YouTube channel.

A bunch of us both watch and provide links to his library of typewriter repair videos on a daily basis. Many of us know how to tear down and build up a typewriter because of his tutorials and years of work. Once you attempt to repair a typewriter for yourself, you’ll realize how skilled he was to be able to simultaneously film his work while he did it. (I swear he had six hands….) He also patiently dispensed (and still asked for his own repair advice) on a regular basis on Facebook.

Thousands of his repaired machines will continue to give people joy every day. He’ll be missed terribly in the typewriter community, but fortunately some of his work and his spirit will continue live on online.

For those who don’t know him as well (yet), here’s an article about Duane from last year: Meet one of the few people in America who knows how to fix manual typewriters, and an excellent podcast from September 2024: Charm Type Repair podcast w/ Duane Jensen of Phoenix Typewriter.

Because it was his usual sign off, I feel obligated to quote him:

Phoenix Typewriter, Good Day!
—Duane Jensen