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U.S. NAVY BASIC MECHANISMS OF FIRE CONTROL COMPUTERS MECHANICAL COMPUTER INSTRUCTIONAL FILM 27794

PeriscopeFilm · tutorial · Watch on YouTube

Mechanical & precision engineeringHistory of computingMilitary history & warfare

What it is

A 1953 US Navy training film on the basic mechanisms in fire control computers: shafts, gears, cams and differentials. It shows how these mechanical parts compute ship and target firing solutions.

Why Hacker News recommends it

HN treats it as the classic demonstration of how analog mechanical computation works, especially the differential gear section.

  • 11 people recommended it
  • 11 different months
  • 1 strong recommendations
  • first 2018, last 2026

What HN commenters said

  1. “It still amazes me how effectively they presented complex topics then.”

    Effective presentation of complex topics in old film

    ethbr1, 2023-11 · Strong recommendation · in “Lost Doctor Who episodes found but owner is reluctant to hand them to BBC”

  2. “You might like this video about the US Navy fire control computer.”

    US Navy fire control computer using cams and differential gears

    jeffwass, 2018-08 · Recommendation · in “Tide-Predicting Machine No. 2”

  3. “If you want more information on how you can do computation with mechanical systems, try this video”

    Explains computation with mechanical systems

    Scaevolus, 2019-09 · Recommendation · in “UCLA’s 1948 Mechanical Computer [video]”

  4. “Here's a film that goes over a lot of the basics”

    1953 Navy film on how fire control computers worked

    tzs, 2020-04 · Recommendation · in “How to Use a Differential Analyzer”

  5. “Mechanical analog computing FTW!”

    Mechanical analog computing example

    fallous, 2020-10 · Recommendation · in “Show HN: What would mechanical programming look like?”

  6. “I learned you can do a lot of computations with gears and shafts.”

    Shows computation with gears and shafts

    segfaultbuserr, 2020-12 · Recommendation · in “1937 film explains how a car differential works”

  7. “The cylinder mechanism (of 2x inputs mapped to 1x output) is specifically talked about here”

    Details on cam-cylinder mechanism of fire control computers

    dragontamer, 2022-04 · Recommendation · in “Why a Slide Rule Works”

  8. “The US Navy had this great video on principles of mechanical computers.”

    Principles of computing functions with cams and gears

    pkaye, 2022-05 · Recommendation · in “Collection of US Navy Training Courses Developed”

Excerpts from Hacker News comments, linked to the originals. Summaries and labels were written by a language model from those comments.

Topics: fire control computer, differential gears, cams, navy training film, analog computing

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