As my 'era' is the time between 1880 and 1920 I needed something that would look as if it was a Hi Tech Victorian installation that was still running in the early Jazz era... I had a look around the local Industrial Museum at various telephone systems that they had there and I have had a look at signal box interiors in books. I came up with a hand wired and heavy cable look that I think fits the bill.

This is the 'frame' - a couple of Model Signal Engineer GEM frames that cost me about £20 the pair.

The main power relay board is Ye Olde VeroBoarde... onto which have been soldered the relays (DPDT 8A 12V). The edge of the board has been re-enforced with 6mm pine and some 'decorative' wiring installed over the front. The relays have metal tags on them that are from a Craft Shop (they are called Charms?)

The additional circuit boards on the left are the diode matrix and LEDs that form the 'program' for Medusa.

Here the circuit boards have been mounted in their 'comb' at the back of the main relay board and the cables to each matrix board have been connected to a 'flying' D25 socket. I tried to do proper 'gangers knots' but the waxed thread and sealing wax trick defeated me -so I super glued them... I know that an RS232C D25[f] connector may not be very Victorian -however the last time I can remember soldering one was in 1988 for a GENUINE vt100 terminal running at 9600 baud. So given the change in computer technology I believe I could comfortably class this as 'stone age'!!!

My small sons' control box with its three switches has been completed. His switches are X Y and Z. Mine are A B E D H J F and G.

His box generates ONLY 000, 010, and 111. My box having EIGHT switches can generate a few more... Basically although I move what looks like signal levers what I am sending is a binary number. The mechanism 'reads' this and acts upon the 'program' in the diode matrix.. There is a very simple mechanical interlocking on the frame -but there are only certain binary numbers that cause operations of the mechanism -a simple belt and braces backup!!!