Submission + - Building Babbage's Analytical Engine (guardian.co.uk)
An anonymous reader writes: Anybody think 3-d printing technology will have enough moxie to pull this off by 2021, the 150th anniversary of Babbage's passing?
The Guardian reports "Now Plan 28 – named after one set of Babbage's plans – has assembled the leading technical experts on his designs and just started fundraising. The first stage of the project involves studying the thousands of pages of handwritten notes that Babbage left behind, to determine what exactly needs to be built.
Once the study is complete, we'll be building a 3D physical computer simulation of the analytical engine to verify that his design is workable. Reaching that stage is likely to cost about £250,000. Only once the feasibility of building the machine has been established will the much larger fundraising effort needed for the actual construction begin. But what we hope to do is create a working monument to the man who conceived the computer, and to inspire today's scientists and engineers to dream a century into their future."
The Guardian reports "Now Plan 28 – named after one set of Babbage's plans – has assembled the leading technical experts on his designs and just started fundraising. The first stage of the project involves studying the thousands of pages of handwritten notes that Babbage left behind, to determine what exactly needs to be built.
Once the study is complete, we'll be building a 3D physical computer simulation of the analytical engine to verify that his design is workable. Reaching that stage is likely to cost about £250,000. Only once the feasibility of building the machine has been established will the much larger fundraising effort needed for the actual construction begin. But what we hope to do is create a working monument to the man who conceived the computer, and to inspire today's scientists and engineers to dream a century into their future."
