Enigma-E Cypher Machine DIY Building Kit - Gizmodo Comments

Enigma-E Cypher Machine DIY Building Kit

Worf — Thu, 16 Mar 2006 12:02:29 EST

Well, it's a rather sophisticated kit - all the mechanicals (the rotors) have been replaced with a nice alphanumeric set of displays. And being built out of modern components, it's a neat little device that shows the basics of encryption/decryption. Plus, it does the 4-rotor Enigma machines, which were uncrackable during the war (but 4-rotors were very rare - they used 3 rotor units for most communications (the "4th" rotor in the 3 rotor enigmas was the non-moving reflector). Of course, the other reason why Enigma was cracked was due to very poor security practices (user error) that compromised the security of the Enigma machines (they can be very secure... when used correctly).

Worf

Enigma-E Cypher Machine DIY Building Kit

jrghoull — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 15:18:26 EST

they want over 250 dollars for a KIT!? cripes...well i would never actually buy this but i do find these things real nifty. always thought it would be cool if they made some sort of steampunk commercial version of it. Would be alot of fun for about 5 minutes if done correctly

jrghoull

Enigma-E Cypher Machine DIY Building Kit

retrothing — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 13:52:10 EST

As I mentioned in the Retro Thing post, the wooden case shown here costs an extra $100. The kit doesn't come with the retro keycaps, either, but those should be easy enough to plunder from an old mechanical typewriter.

retrothing