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What items do you recall that were once....but are no more?

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Hamish Racing said:
You may be closer to the truth than you think …….
crisp (chips) bags are filled with nitrogen gas,
not just air, to keep them fresh and prevent breaking. This process, called modified atmosphere packaging or MAP it replaces oxygen or air —which makes food go stale—with nitrogen, an inert gas that keeps crisps crunchy and fresher longer
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You learn something new every day.
 
mikephillips said:
Yep.

And here's another I never see anymore. Erector sets. Do kids like to bolt things together and build stuff anymore??..
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Too many tools required, too many sharp edges.
Might put their eye out!!!
 
You can still buy Erector sets, I have a friend who teaches robotics (among other things) at the local vo-tech and the robots they build for competition are either Erector or something very similar.
 
mikephillips said:
Yep.

And here's another I never see anymore. Erector sets. Do kids like to bolt things together and build stuff anymore??..
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Replaced by Legos
 
waltesefalcon said:
You can still buy Erector sets, I have a friend who teaches robotics (among other things) at the local vo-tech and the robots they build for competition are either Erector or something very similar.
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I built a sky scraper with my set.
 
waltesefalcon said:
I liked building cranes and the like with mine.
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mine could supposedly build a record player.... by the time I got it 2nd or 3rd or 4th hand... I only had part of the base for record player.

More interesting I have a large collection of Fischertechnik building blocks / motors, gears etc which I started collecting in the W.Germany in the mid 70's. I tried getting my kids interested in that....... because I was/am looking for excuses to buy more, sadly none of them got interested enough in building. They were creating building systems similar to Lego Technical 10-20 years ahead of Lego
 
I've never heard of Fischertechnik, but I do remember my first set of Lego Technic very well, I think I still have it in a closet. I thought that was the best thing it was halfway between a Lego set and an Erector set.
 
waltesefalcon said:
I've never heard of Fischertechnik, but I do remember my first set of Lego Technic very well, I think I still have it in a closet. I thought that was the best thing it was halfway between a Lego set and an Erector set.
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you would like fischertechnik :smile:
Lego with a much more science / industry focus. When I was a kid they had more basic "toys" sort of competition with lego, but it seems that has been dropped with more focus on STEM, university training (you can hook them up to real PLCs) or even simulating near industrial types of robotics (in "toy" form) All sorts of motors gear drives computer interfaces... looks like they can be programed with Python now... I better stop looking at this no money or time left for extra toys.
> fischertechnik <
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70herald said:
mine could supposedly build a record player.... by the time I got it 2nd or 3rd or 4th hand... I only had part of the base for record player.

More interesting I have a large collection of Fischertechnik building blocks / motors, gears etc which I started collecting in the W.Germany in the mid 70's. I tried getting my kids interested in that....... because I was/am looking for excuses to buy more, sadly none of them got interested enough in building. They were creating building systems similar to Lego Technical 10-20 years ahead of Lego
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Man, there is a brand I have not heard of in ages! Glad they are still around. It was always a wonderful Christmas/birthday when a new kit was received!

And, yes, kids still build. They still draw. They still read. They might build different things and in different ways than we did - fewer model train sets and more programmable logic - but the curiosity and pleasure from mechanical assembly has not spontaneously ceased to exist in recent generations.
 
Friden and Marchant mechanical calculators. I worked summers as a night cost clerk late '50s - early '60s for a Green Giant canning company. We were told never to do any mental calculations for our reports.
 
My dad used to have a mechanical calculator in his office back when I was a kid. punch in the numbers, pull the lever, pick the basic math operation and key in the next number, pull the lever again to get the answer. I thought it was so neat when I got my first electronic version, for $300 bucks back the mid 70s.
 
I believe that every British car must have a piece of meccano on it somewhere. On mine it is part of the throttle linkage.
 
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