On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 05:00:03 -0800, Tim Shoppa wrote:

R.H. wrote:

Some of the items in the unsolved
set may have been correctly answered previously but I
wasn't able to verify them so I've included them
in this new post.

My one piece of insight to share on #471 is that if you look at the red
numbers, they are different by 4 or 5 from the adjacent red numbers.
With the exception of 9 and 0 (which are either 1 or 9 apart, depending
on how you look at it.)

My gut feeling is that this dial is for remapping the 0-9 digits such
that adjacent digits do not come out near each other in the remap,
maybe something like a grey code. The 20-tooth cog and the
microswitch-style rider look like something out of a phone
pulse-switching system, although what kind of stepper switch they might
control I still do not fathom.


Maybe from an "Enigma" coder/decoder circa WWII. I'm almost sure I've
seen such a thing before - the 45 degree bevel on the back is a
dead giveaway that it stuck out from some console, but I can't remember
for the life of me where I've seen it.

Thanks,
Rich