Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire What is this contraption?

Bob wire fence stretcher.

Any chance you grandfather was a teacher of some sort and this was made to illustrate basic mechanics of gearing?
Or a sales prop for someone to show clients?

All in all I have no clue.

No idea, but the vertical plate between the gear mechanism and the spool Looks like it is made to slide out without much effort. I wonder if the whole rig is made to slide out to change different spools for some purpose. That would allow for the spool appearing to be an independent part from the rest of the set up.
From the hole in the spool it looks like it would turn forward and down when the handles is turned. I wonder about the gear ratio too. It also looks like a dust cover or Id plate may have covered the gears at on time.

As someone already stated it started life as Victrola Guts....

What it is NOW, you would need to ask the tinkerer....

Drunken Ruffians...........

That is pretty interesting. So If that’s it, the spool is not a direct drive from the crank. Instead Appears the crank loads a coil spring and the spool turns from the spring tension without having to turn the handle while Loading the spool. Somebody with a good imagination it looks like if it is indeed a repurpose effort.

If you visit the factory, in Finland, they say "Welcome to Sock-Oh". Similarly, if you travel up the road a bit, you will hear "Welcome to Lap-Wah"

Poor Fins. You'd think someone would educate them on how to pronounce their words.

Yep, that's what is called "throwing a chain". The steel tape was 66 feet in length, one chain. Ten square chains = one acre. A more modern surveyor might have used a hundred-footer. Now I think they all use lasers. Throwing a chain took a little practice, but once you got the hang of it it was easy. Key is to take up the chain in equal lengths before trying to throw it. No surveyor would have wanted or needed anything as convoluted as the OP's item in order to store a chain. A simple reel or throwing it would suffice.

I will take better pics of it and maybe a video if I can post it here.

Now they all use GPS.

It's too flimsy for a wire stretcher. For a good tight wire, I have one of these that's been in the family for many years. It's not on the original rope.


These also work very well although with this you have to pull most of the slack out before you can hook it up. The block and tackle will pull a lot more slack.

Miles---- Yes once ya get the hang of it it's easy, but there is someone always wanting to reinvent the wheel.
Looks handmade -- Gurley would not put out anything that rough.

A rotary motion redirector.

With the optional force compounder.

Clearly. Duh.

That's probably right. Another way for them to get away with not marking the lines. Take the easiest roundabout route to set or locate the corners, then the person needing to know where the line runs has to hire another surveyor or run it himself using good ol' bearings and distances.

Left handed Zip wheel

It's a Turbo Encabulator

It’s a flux’s capacitor???

It is a "Space Box".

Ancient Alien theorists say that it was accidently left behind after a UFO landed. Accidentally dropped by a Martian.

Depending on the size of the box, I was thinking field Communications wire real.