M Numbers, Rhyme or Reason?

Rafaga · Aug 12, 2021

Looking through some of my old tooling catalogs (No.50 / No.70) I see M numbers ranging from low three digits into the 4000's or so. I've seen pictures of an SC45 M7000.

I'm guessing somewhere back in the day it must have started at Number 1. Is there a rhyme or reason to the M numbers? Some classification system to decipher what a part is based on the number? Or simply a running list where a new product was assigned the next number in sequence?

Any idea what the last M number was?

DocsMachine · Aug 14, 2021

No rhyme or reason I've seen.

I've always suspected that early on, it was a more or less logical progression, as their first lathe was, as I understand it, a "Model 1".

But the tool catalogs skip big batches of numbers. I suppose it's possible the 'missing' ones were obsoleted tools and machines no longer listed (the company, after all, had been in business some forty, almost fifty years before my earliest book was printed.)

All guess at this point, unless one of the Old Guard wanders in to see why the lights are still on.

Doc.

Rafaga · Aug 29, 2021

DocsMachine said:
No rhyme or reason I've seen.

I suppose it's possible the 'missing' ones were obsoleted tools and machines no longer listed (the company, after all, had been in business some forty, almost fifty years before my earliest book was printed.)

Doc.

After your mention of "missing" numbers something occurred to me. WS also made grinders (Norton), sheetmetal machines (Wiedematic), textile machines, construction machines, cranes, even saw an electric generator on ebay just a few days ago.

That might explain the big jumps in numbers.

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M Numbers, Rhyme or Reason?

Rafaga

Plastic

DocsMachine

Titanium

Rafaga

Plastic

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