Teaser … more on Blackbag Sunday

Wow! Yesterday visited Toool Eindhoven, and had a very, very good time.
On ‘Blackbag Sunday’ you can read the whole story.

Or maybe someone can crack the puzzle by identifying the image below …

teaser ...

13 Responses to “Teaser … more on Blackbag Sunday”

  1. Quux says:

    ENIGMA

  2. Wow, Naval Enigma 😛

  3. Barry says:

    Quux: 10 points for being the first to comment 😉

    Jaakko: 10 points for being more precise then Quux

    And André: I did read your previous comment again yesterday doing research.
    I am sorry to tease, but more will be clear on sunday when I post the answer.

    Unless of course someone beats me to it and posts the correct answer in the comments …
    (toool eindhoven members excluded 😉

  4. Travis says:

    wow, that is a nice piece of history, I cannot wait to see the video

  5. HF905 says:

    ALPFQ LVVWO UUDKN XGOUA K

  6. GigaWalt says:

    André, that picture of the Naval Enigma at Bletchley actually does show a lock. It is right of the rightmost wheel. I agree, not a lock you couldn’t easily open destructively, but still a lock 🙂

  7. Jean-Claude says:

    I believe this is a Naval version of the Wehrmacht Enimga (model M4) 4-rotor cipher machine. Interestingly, shouldn’t the black rotor be located in the 4th position? I believe there were three unique rotors used in this model, the Alpha being the second generation after the 3-rotors were converted to 4-rotors by slimming down the thickness. Two other rotors were Beta and Gamma, which apparently did not step, but could be dialled manually.

    If anyone has any complaints or corrections, shoot.

  8. rukwind says:

    @Jean-Claude: the black rotor just happens to be black. During the war metal was scarce, so Bakelite got used. I guess the black one and the metal ones don’t originate from the same set.

  9. Jean-Claude says:

    From http://users.telenet.be/d.rijmenants/en/enigmatech.htm

    “The machine was introduced with three rotors. In 1939 the set was extended to five rotors, marked with Roman numerals I, II, III, IV and V, all with a single notch. The Kriegmarine extended the set of rotors with another three rotors called VI, VII and VIII, with two notches. In 1942, the Kriegsmarine M4 introduced a fourth rotor. To achieve this, the wide B and C reflectors from the three rotor version was replaced by thin B and C reflectors, leaving room for the special fourth rotor. The fourth rotors were of two configurations, named Beta and Gamma, with spring-loaded contacts on both sides. They were incompatible with the other eight rotors.”

    Since the fourth rotor was introduced towards the end of the war, that would seem to agree with rukwind’s assessment that the rotor is indeed constructed of bakelite, due to an increasing shortage of raw materials available to Germany.

  10. Jean-Claude says:

    VHBWJ PJPRV ZOFKP HBXVR VDGPD

  11. Jean-Claude says:

    C gamma VII III V

  12. HF905 says:

    Mine is B Beta I II III. http://frode.home.cern.ch/frode/crypto/simula/index.html (Naval enigma M4)