Very odd table - thoughts?

It might be that there were different models of furniture that used interchangeable parts. Perhaps this would have held a radio in a different configuration of the table.

 

Good morning af!

Here's what there is.

At the top, a row of sets of indentations, two on the outside larger the middle smaller. They're labelled L1 L2 E F K1 K2 K3. The numbers are subscripts.

Then, reading clockwise, more sets of identical indentations, which go A4 down to A1, then B1-4, and so on down to H1 to H4. Again, all numbers are subscripts. There are two sets of six indentations at roughly two and ten o'clock, one labelled BATT the other COND. At about four o'clock are two sets of indentations labelled P1 and P2. There's two sets of two unlabelled indentations in the middle, adjacent to the C and F sets. Each of the holes that actually goes through the base corresponds to one of the letter sets, with a further two corresponding to the top row, if that makes sense.

On the underside of the lid is engraved E20 N.T. No 10.

There's nothing to indicate anything ever went in - no scratches, or wear, other than the middle hole which is simply where the connecting rod to the lid fits.

 

Just thought it might have bee a breadboard for something else, reused for some inexplicable purpose. P and C standing for potentiometer and condenser, I was looking for resistors, but that letter arrangement apart from L for line makes no more sense.

 

I feel this is a commercially-manufactured radio table from ca. 1920's. I asked about it on a specialized radio forum but it would not let me post a link back to here, so this may take a day or two.

 

"There's nothing to indicate anything ever went in - no scratches, or wear, other than the middle hole which is simply where the connecting rod to the lid fits."

Owned look again.
I think it is picture #6 - there is a metal bracket with 3 flat head screws and what appears to be the rod that goes through the center hole that the nut attaches to under the table. So what we are looking at there is the underside of the top of the table - Correct?

Also note that there is a round scratch, indentation, (what ever you want to call it); that doesn't match up with the hexagon base. It appears that there was something round inserted into the table that the top sat on.

 

Spring, thanks much, let's see what they say. It is very shallow internally, and there's no indication of any place that controls would have gone - all the radio tables I've ever seen have been far deeper, and had something like a flap concealing the controls. They've also usually not had a bottom if that makes sense!

cluttered, yes, there is indeed a round scratch and I've just added to it, I think! It lines up precisely with those brass lugs - I think it was caused by people trying to line the top up with them in order to put it back. The round scratch is actually slightly larger than the internal dimensions of the hexagonal base. Also, the brass lugs and connecting rod show no sign of having been modified. If something else had sat under the lid, the rod would have needed to be much longer, I'd have thought.

Thanks for all the help, guys!

 

Don, just seen yours. Great minds! There is actually an X on the lid, faintly, and one on the base, but if you don't realise it, or get the alignment wrong, yes, it scratches.

It is well made, and it's solid mahogany, too.

 

Just throwing thoughts out there, so how about this one.

Jewish family, afraid during wartime that they might have their valuables taken from them.

Someone gets creative using whatever materials are available, ie. circuit board and creates a false space to hide whatever.
Is it the best place? Maybe for the time period, why look at what is right in front of you. TV not being what it is today, exposing everything.

 

they were more worried for their lives....

 

Thing is, the family this woman came from had lived in England for about 150 years or more. It's possible they might have been wary, but from my own Jewish refugee family, I know they felt pretty safe once they got here, and that was in 1938.

The other point is that all the letters and indentations on the "board" line up far too nicely with the shape of the base - the hexagon looks as though it were made to suit. And when you look at it upside down, the grain of the polished outside of the base lines up.

 

I also think something to do with lace making. Batt seems to be what lace thread is called. Although no doubt any type of needlework threading is probably called batt or roving. All those small holes might have something to do with allll the many threads used in bobbin lace making. I really know nothing about lace making so don't know how this table would be used. Possibly the threads, batts, were stored up in this table with individual threads assigned each hole??? I have googled finding nothing quite like it. The bobbin lace makers' pics all seem to be working with bobbins and a pillow. The following article talks about spinning lace thread calling it batt and or roving.

http://fleeglesblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/spinning-for-lace-part-3-fiber.html

--- Susan

 

Interesting! I wondered if the A to H indentations were meant to take some kind of peg with the resulting four ply going through the corresponding hole. Doesn't explain the other top row - it has to mean something, or why bother?

I suspect the major clue is that pattern or model number on the lid, but despite all google efforts I can't find it. N T is obviously an abbreviation, given the full stops. So, it's an E20 Nxxxx Txxxx number 10.

 

Well, this is interesting. No photos, and they never found out what it was!

http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/new-old-kid-on-the-block-t15006.html

 

Only an hour left until my 24-hour clockaversary and link-posting rights on the specialized board! If they don't ID it today I'll be shocked. Whether it was made as part of a radio or a quack medical device I dunno but someone online will know. Someone speculated about the letter L and in old schematics L always means an inductor aka coil of wire. "No. Xx" tends to be British for what in US would be called "model," at least for military equipment and perhaps some civilian items made by firms used to military production.

 

That's how the military equipment is labeled. It's easier to read a schematic with those letters and to identify what components are in that cicrcuit. I was in the military working in the motorpool as a mechanic and generator mechanic, so I'm use to seeing those letters and numbers.

 

I still think (with nothing to back it up ) that it has nothing at all to do with radio transmission or receiving.

 

Yes I think a scholarly study of how threads proceed in different countries would be interesting. I may have mentioned that I've taken some extended excursions on foreign antique forums, notably ones exclusively (except for me) Spanish, Italian, and French. The French and Spanish both produced good results, providing info on cannons of those nationalities that I could not find anywhere else.

The Italian forum was like a trip to another planet, posters put up great colorful art and very interesting commentary which was seldom on topic but fascinating to read. I used google translate to post and read, and we seemed to understand each other well enuf.

I cannot find either the Italian or Spanish forums anymore, guessing hard economic times in So. Europe have caused their demise.