#meccano

[aneverydaything]

Day 2707, 21 November 2025

A Meccano building, Canary Wharf, London

[sailing-on-a-puddle]

At the weekend my husband and kiddos went to Beamish (massive museum in North East England, if you can go do it's amazing) and they had a guest exhibition from the North East Meccano Society. I was away but I feel a bit sad because I didn't see MECCANO TWO AND FOUR!!!

Aren't they brilliant?

[eightiesandninetiesforever]

Meccano Erector Set commercial [1993]

Source [YT: GrowinupinSincity81]

[coccorespi]

I recently received a lot of messy yarn from my sister, so I was inspired and now I'm doing this :')

It should be a yarn winder, it doesn't work really well because the weight of the yarn slows it down when it spins.

My first try is the one with the pink yarn, but today I worked on it again and used only Lego.

I need to find a better way to connect the motor to the other side because sometimes the elastic doesn't even move. The tension of the yarn remains a mystery, it's always a little loose.

I'm happy that l'm doing something new :)

[all-action-all-picture]

The Age of the Truck. A 1974 ad for Meccano sets to be won with packets of Rice Krispies!

This offer finished over 50 years ago so don't be spending too long in the supermarket looking for the special competition packs.

[chernobog13]

The Dinky U.F.O. Interceptor, produced in 1971, and based on the U.F.O. television series.

I'm sure child safety groups had all sorts of conniptions over the cap-fired rocket at the front.

[foone]

So during a meeting the question came up "is Meccano the same as Erector Sets?" and I had to look it up.

So Meccano started making a constructor set in 1901, in England, where metal strips are connected with other pieces using nuts and bolts. It was an important introduction to mechanical engineering for a lot of kids.

And in 1913, a construction set was launched in the US, called Erector. It similarly involved metal strips that could be connected together with nuts and bolts, and was an important introduction to mechanical engineering for a lot of kids.

So they're not the same, just similar toys in different countries.

Except, in 1990, Meccano purchased the Erector brand, and unified their toys. And both companies, now merged, were purchased by the Canadian toy company Spin Master (creators and owners by PAW Patrol) in 2013. They're still making Meccano in Europe, but Meccano sets in the US are sold as "Erector by Meccano", to tie back into the name brand better known in America.

Anyway, if you want to ask me "are you a boy or a girl?", this is the kind of answer I'd have to give you.

[alpaca-dave]

Meccano Forklift

I got that Meccano forklift completed. It works but is a little underpowered, I need a 20 V power supply and my model train power supply only puts out 15 V. Will have to look for one.

The design is from a 1950s booklet and the parts are mostly of the same vintage, with a few newer parts mixed in.

Maybe I’ll make a video of the gear operation; it has forward/reverse and the forks go up and down, all geared off of the one motor.