Analog Computing Component - Integrator from the ASN-7 Aircraft Navigation Computer

This component has an aluminum frame and three gears on top. It appears to have two similar mechanisms on the inside – each includes a shaft, a screw with linkages, and a cylinder turned by rotating a gear on the outside. These gears are unequal but are linked by a third, double gear on the outside. A number on the side of the frame with gears reads: 70-577. A mark on both of the mechanisms that move along screws on the inside reads: 51-520. A plasticized tag on the side of the frame reads: #78a.

Objects 1982.0751.35, 1982.0751.36, and 1982.0751.37 are stored together in a wooden box lined with fabric that has a black handle. A tag on it reads: #78 Integrators 78a, 78b, 78c. The handle has two paper labels attached to it with string. One reads: Grand Central Terminal (/) Red Cap Service (/) Serial Number 35773 Red Cap Number 137. The other reads: No. 83583 Q.

According to the accession file, this is an integrator described as: Two unit used on ASN-7 Aircraft Navigation System.

References:

A.B. Clymer, "The Mechanical Analog Computers of Hannibal Ford and William Newell," Annals of the History of Computing, 15, #2, 1993, 19-34.

Accession file.

K.C. Epstein, Analog Superpowers: How Twentieth Century Technology Theft Built the National Security State, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2024.

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