Curta Type I

grabcad

This is my model of a Curta Type I calculator produced from the original factory drawings , everything is included in the drawings so I was able to complete the whole model with only a few problem areas, main problem being item 10070 which may be beyond my expertise or software usedSoftware used was Fusion 360 which did a great job but the free version is limited in the type of CAD export that can be done, I could possibly do other formats at work if anyoune was interested.History from wikipedia.The Curta was conceived by Curt Herzstark in the 1930s in Vienna, Austria. By 1938, he had filed a key patent, covering his complemented stepped drum, Deutsches Reichspatent (German National Patent) No. 747073. This single drum replaced the multiple drums, typically around 10 or so, of contemporary calculators, and it enabled not only addition, but subtraction through nines complement math, essentially subtracting by adding. The nines' complement math breakthrough eliminated the significant mechanical complexity created when "borrowing" during subtraction. This drum was the key to miniaturizing the Curta.His work on the pocket calculator stopped in 1938 when the Nazis forced him and his company to concentrate on manufacturing precision instruments for the German army.[2]Herzstark, the son of a Catholic mother and Jewish father, was taken into custody in 1943 and eventually sent to Buchenwald concentration camp, where he was encouraged to continue his earlier research:While I was imprisoned inside Buchenwald I had, after a few days, told the [people] in the work production scheduling department of my ideas. The head of the department, Mr. Munich said, 'See, Herzstark, I understand you've been working on a new thing, a small calculating machine. Do you know, I can give you a tip. We will allow you to make and draw everything. If it is really worth something, then we will give it to the Führer as a present after we win the war. Then, surely, you will be made an Aryan.' For me, that was the first time I thought to myself, my God, if you do this, you can extend your life. And then and there I started to draw the CURTA, the way I had imagined it.[3][2]In the camp, Herzstark was able to develop working drawings for a manufacturable device. Buchenwald was liberated by U.S. troops on April 11, 1945, and by November Herzstark had located a factory in Sommertal, near Weimar, whose machinists were skilled enough to produce three working prototypes.[3]Soviet forces had arrived in July, and Herzstark feared being sent to Russia, so, later that same month, he fled to Austria. He began to look for financial backers, at the same time filing continuing patents as well as several additional patents to protect his work. Franz Joseph II, Prince of Liechtenstein eventually showed interest in the manufacture of the device, and soon a newly formed company, Contina AG Mauren, began production in Liechtenstein.It was not long before Herzstark's financial backers, thinking they had got from him all they needed, conspired to force him out by reducing the value of all of the company's existing stock to zero, including his one-third interest.[1] These were the same people who had earlier elected not to have Herzstark transfer ownership of his patents to the company, so that, should anyone sue, they would be suing Herzstark, not the company, thereby protecting themselves at Herzstark's expense. This ploy now backfired: without the patent rights, they could manufacture nothing. Herzstark was able to negotiate a new agreement, and money continued to flow to him.Curtas were considered the best portable calculators available until they were displaced by electronic calculators in the 1970s.[1] The Curta, however, lives on, being a highly popular collectible, with thousands of machines working just as smoothly as they did at the time of their manufacture 40, 50 or 60 years previoushttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curta