Can you explain what these little clips might be?

[Daniel Paul Cotts]

Will do this coming week. When they express interest what is the next step?

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

Will do this coming week. When they express interest what is the next step?

Steal the text, pictures, and measurements from the article on the gidgies.  Write a very short article explaining that TIGHAR is stumped--we just can't imagine who would make things like this and we're hoping that some woodworkers might be able to identify a use for such odd things.

[Daniel Paul Cotts]

Editor of Fine Woodworking redirected me to their online forum. Mini-article posted.
http://forums.finewoodworking.com/fine-woodworking-knots/general-discussion/amelia-earhart-artifacts

While snooping on tighar I found an evaluation of the screws:
http://tighar.org/TTracks/2002Vol_18/1804.pdf

The screws are brass American No. 8, 15/16" length woodscrews meeting specifications that were current from the 1930s up until 1970.

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

Editor of Fine Woodworking redirected me to their online forum. Mini-article posted.
http://forums.finewoodworking.com/fine-woodworking-knots/general-discussion/amelia-earhart-artifacts

Well done!

While snooping on tighar I found an evaluation of the screws:
http://tighar.org/TTracks/2002Vol_18/1804.pdf

The screws are brass American No. 8, 15/16" length woodscrews meeting specifications that were current from the 1930s up until 1970.

Thanks.  I'll add that to the gidgies page in the wiki.

[Rudolf Alfons De Meter]

"And he puzzled and puzzed, 'til his puzzler was sore . . . " (from "How the Grinch Stole Christmas")

I have puzzled over those clips for a long time. Have not had a "Eureka!" moment yet. Those things annoy me!

These thing do not annoy only you. They annoy me as well (still).

I wrote that I thought they were machine-made. Some say they have not.

They are made out of non-magnetic metal and have a silvery appearance. This excludes brass or copper, since exposure would have produced a layer of copper oxide which tends to be green(ish).

This almost only leaves aluminium.

The "clips" appear to me to be about 1.5 mm thick.

Small clips, 1.5 mm thick, aluminium, carefully hand-made. Screw is obviously a wood screw, meant to be screwed in wood at least 30 mm thick, since the screws are about 25 mm long.
30 mm is a thick plank for a box, but who says the screws were screwed into a plank ? Or something even thicker ?

Some will call me Captain Obvious now, I know.

Some of Tighar's members, I am sure, will have some (excellent) skills in working, transforming aluminium sheet.

Now, please get a piece of 1.5 mm Al sheet (Dural if you wish), and trace the outline the way a professional tracer would do it, using tracing blue or, nowadays, a felt marker and a tracing needle. Of course, you would have previously made an accurate sketch of the piece, traced it on cardboard or so and then cut it out to make your tracing pattern on the aluminium.

Place your traced piece of Al sheet in a vise with soft clamps, get your finest jigsaw to make a slightly too large rough cut, much in the way a jeweller would do it, and cut the "clip"out of the sheet.

Next step would be to "finish" the "clip", smoothing the edges with file and sandpaper so not to leave any saw burrs and drill the hole, again without any burrs.

Handmade, you say ? Maybe, but my guess is that you may well spend over one hour to fabricate one of these clips. An expensive "clip" in any time frame.

I happen to live near Angoulême, in the Charente department of France, a town with a world reputation of jewellery making. A "bijoutier" here, is a person, artisan who does all the "metalwork" before any precious stones are set in by another, specialized artisan.

So I went to see my friend "bijoutier" Stefan, who has his workshop in the village of Sers. He is known for precision, fast work. I showed him the pictures of the clips.

To reproduce those, he said, with the same precision, he thought he would spend about one hour apiece. He also thought the clips were stamped out, not being worth the work for whatever purpose they may have been meant.

So my point is: if the clips were really hand-made, some skilled person must have spent substantial time fabricating them, which might indicate they would have been used for some very valuable (wooden) assembly of some sort.

Just an Idea i had.

Rudolf.

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

... So my point is: if the clips were really hand-made, some skilled person must have spent substantial time fabricating them, which might indicate they would have been used for some very valuable (wooden) assembly of some sort.

Thanks for the explanation of the issues and for the little peek into the world of jewelry.

Folks on ships and islanders have lots of time for handcrafts.  Look at the handmade aluminum comb from Niku.  The analysis says it is "crudely made," but I disagree.  Hand made, yes, but very nicely done.  Once in a blue moon, I've tried to fashion little things out of sheet aluminum (very small sheets from the hobby store).  I have some idea of what it takes.  Our clip-maker did nice work.

[Don Dollinger]

I have seen clips similiar to these on an old car (40's Willy's Coupe) that I once tore down.  In the rearseat area the carpeting went to the end of the floor pan and then traveled up the inside about 6" where it met the bottom of the inside trim panel (part that contains arm rest, window winder, etc.) and there were pieces similiar to this that held the bottom of the carpet against the floor and against the panel to form a sharp crease at that corner.  Had no reason to examine them closely but they looked alot like the ones shown there only they were made of steel and only had 1 screw attaching them to the floor pan.  The teeth gripped the carpet.  Biggest problem is I can not guarantee that the carpet was original as this was on a hot rod that had passed through a few hands before it got to me.  Look closer Ric, there may be a 40's Willy Coupe parked nearby.    :o

LTM,

Don

[Ricker H Jones]

The clips found at the Seven Site, and an aluminum nail found later, seem compatible with what was once thought to be a "dado" (trim piece), and is now posited to be a heat shield.  Its purpose for the castaways may have been an attempt to improvise a cook top which ultimately was consumed by the fire, with the gidgies and the nails falling out on the ground before hand.  Your comments merit additional research.
Rick J

[Patrick Dickson]

"Maybe the serrations are there to grip fabric or carpet ?? as in an airliner. Even though the Electra interior had been extensively modified, there may have been some of the original fabric panels or carpeting still in place...maybe a piece easily removed when salvaging items from the plane that could have been carried to the Seven site ??"

my thoughts from an earlier post. I have done auto restorations, but not aircraft......I have seen these type of clips somewhere in the past...

[John Joseph Barrett]

Has anyone contacted the Paul E. Garber facility in Silver Hill, MD about these. As the restoration facility for aircraft for the Smithsonian Institution they may be able to answer if these are aircraft parts and what they might be used for. If no one has, I will attempt to cut/paste/copy the necessary info and see if I can come up with anything.  LTM

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

Has anyone contacted the Paul E. Garber facility in Silver Hill, MD about these. As the restoration facility for aircraft for the Smithsonian Institution they may be able to answer if these are aircraft parts and what they might be used for. If no one has, I will attempt to cut/paste/copy the necessary info and see if I can come up with anything.  LTM

Go for it.  No harm in trying.  A lot of people work at Garber.  Someone may have seen something like the gidgies somewhere.

[Chris Johnson]

What about the fitting inside this sextant box?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330646043013

6th picture, empty box with some kind of retaining device?

[Rich Ramsey]

Damn Chris nice find. I'd almost buy that one. That little piece at the end of the arm holding it on the box looks dead on in the picture. I will say that they "old Car" story fits too as I had a '51 Pontiac with the same parts in it. They too look the same. I am glad I am not Ric and have to figure these things out.

[John Ousterhout]

I don't think the Brandis Sextant retaining gizzy is the same as the mystery clips.  I have a Kollsman sextant held in its box by a fabric strap, looking somewhat similar to retention system in the Brandis pictures. Each end of the Kollsman strap has a snap that engages a mating button screwed to the box.  The mating buttons have mounting plates each with two screws.  Picture 6 of the Brandis box shows part of what looks to me to be just such a mounting plate, with one screw visible. On the wood rib opposite appears to be a headless screw, and a blemish that is in about the right position for a second screw.  This makes me think there is a mounting plate still on the end of the strap, but the strap appears too short to reach the necessary distance between two such mounting plates.  My Kollsman strap looks like cotton canvas, and has shrunk enough to make snapping it in place a struggle.  The green strap in the Brandis may be shrunken cotton, making it too short now.  The missing screw, and the headless screw, may be the result of an attempt to stretch and connect the too-short strap. The screws couldn't stand the strain.
  The Brandis retention device doesn't look like the button on my more modern Kollsman - more like a knurled thumb screw.  I would expect Brandis to have used similar furniture in their other boxes of similar age.  What other pictures do we have to study?
I'm still intrigued by the mystery clips.  I need to mull them over more before hazarding a guess.

[Chris Johnson]

It was a speculative guess but who knows what modifications may have been made to the box.

What other boxes could they have had? Lazy me needs to look at the Luke Filed Inventory again.  Makes sense to me that they could be from a box or other container that would be useful for transporting and storing survival stuff