It's a great project! Not in any way to downplay the Enigma project that started this thread, but a Bombe project is I think a different order of complexity. (An Enigma project probably has a bigger audience, that being the nature of the difference between encryption and codebreaking.)
Absolutely ...

My desktop model does the rotation and a half and also simulates the slowing down phase when a stop is found. The thing to remember about the Bletchley Bombe is that it was (is) a purely mechanical/electrical device. Physical contacts are being made and broken all the time. Must have been a lot of ...

I just watched "The Imitation Game" about Turing and Enigma.

And the thing that went through my mind watching it was "I bet the props guys had a blast building 'Christopher'", the machine used to try and break the code. I doubt it was an operating, it was just a big box of spinny things, but I bet ...

My path was Vic 20, Apple 2+, Apple 2e, Amiga 500, PC, back to Amiga 500 (since when I was at Uni we used Macs and I was able to run a Mac emulator on the Amiga at home) then back to PCs from then on since. These days I do a lot with micro-controllers, various Arduinos and Teensys mainly, for work ...

Bit late with the reply sorry. I have done it. I added commands for my homemade machine. I can't remember the details now though as it was so long ago but I did blog about things and there might be some pointers in here: http://www.asciimation.co.nz/bb/2013/10/28/orwell-really-running-basic

I haven ...

Steal away! I put things online so people can use them if they like. I think I used a hand nibbling tool. Like this: http://www.amazon.com/Parts-Express-Nickel-Plated-Nibbling/dp/B0002KRACO

You drill a hole then that tool take little bits out of the metal. Very handy. You can also use a Dremel ...

Has anyone seen or played this?

http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/

From the page the description is:

"TIS-100 is an open-ended programming game by Zachtronics, the creators of SpaceChem and Infinifactory, in which you rewrite corrupted code segments to repair the TIS-100 and unlock its secrets ...

I don't have the dimensions on me and Orwell is still packed somewhere (I recently moved cities) but I did a blog post at the time about making it. You should be able to get some idea of how it was made here: http://www.asciimation.co.nz/bb/2015/04/25/orwell-computer-case

I can provide actual ...

Sorry to bring up an old post. But where did you get the metal piece for the case?

Did you have it made?
Sorry for the slow reply! In the last 6 months I have moved cities and careers so things have been busy. I made the case. Metalworking is another of my hobbies. Nothing complicated in it ...

The biggest problem with the Bombe is it's impossible to take it anywhere! Oh, it's portable enough, even has a convenient carry handle. Explaining it to security though might be somewhat problematic :)
It doesn't help that its name is Bombe . :lol: The average security bloke would focus in on ...

Simon, you're clearly a force to be reckoned with! You've gone from creating a ...

Bender to a
Beer Cooler (jet powered) to a
Bombe

and that's just a partial list of your projects . :shock: All I can say is, I'm glad you're on our side!!!
The biggest problem with the Bombe is it's impossible ...

Sorry to dig up an old thread but this might be of interest to people here.

I finally finished my own desktop sized Turing-Welchman Bombe. It doesn't have a 6502 in it of course (Raspberry Pi 2 and an Arduino!) but it is using the same algorithm I wrote in BASIC on my Orwell 6502 computer.

http ...

We have that dilemma with vintage cars all the time. In the past people restored to as new (actually usually to BETTER than new) but these days things are swinging back and the trend is to preserve the vehicles past history as much as possible. It gets worse with old race cars which used to change ...

We used to hear similar doubts about teaching arithmetic or mathematics.

I don't think they do that now. They all use tablets :)

Definitely teaching this stuff is a good idea. I just worry that the people in charge might push it a bit much. Like you say it's a mental discipline but that does ...

A lot of people do call Ada Lovelace the first computer programmer so I think Babbage definitely has a look in!

It is interesting now that there is this big push into trying to teach kids more about computers. We have Arduinos (ok, not really a PC), RaspberryPi, Galileo and I saw the BBC are doing ...