SM7

I’ve mentioned before how an Olympia SM5 typewriter properly started my enthusiasm for these machines. The SM5, when it was new, was a mid-range unit: solidly-built, with plenty of features, but perhaps lacking a certain finesse. I had to wait a long time before getting my hands on one of the flagship Olympia portable models. Not until the dying days of 2022 did I ‘win’ an ebay auction for a 1961 SM7 (shown above). It cost me £50, plus the price of petrol for a trip to Bath and back to collect it.

On getting it home it typed beautifully – the feel was significantly better than the SM5s I’d used. Alas, I’d only been typing for a few minutes when something went awry and the drawband became unseated, rendering my new toy unusable. Disinclined to attempt to fix it there & then I put the machine to one side to wait for the right kind of rainy day to come along. Many rainy days came and went until a very wet Wednesday in late September, when, with the aid of a few simple tools and a pair of very helpful YouTube videos, I removed the carriage, straightened out the drawband, put some tension into the mainspring and then put everything back together again, re-attaching the loose end of the drawband to the end of the carriage as I did so. It’s been typing very well ever since.

While the default colour-scheme for the SM7 was an off-white with green details, they were also made in pale blue, like mine, and in a salmon pink. I thought installing a blue ribbon in it would be a nice touch. It’s wearing its sixty three years very lightly but is not without a few issues. The paper support doesn’t spring out smartly when the button is pressed: some encouragment is needed. Pressing the TAB key induces only a sluggish response from the carriage. And the carriage lock doesn’t work properly. I may yet attempt some further tinkering: for now though I’m just happy to be in a position to use it.