What Is It? Game 97

Posted by Alex in What Is It on April 30, 2009 at 7:59 am


W00t! It’s time for our collaboration with the always mind-boggling What is it? blog. Can you guess what this strange device is used for?

Place your guess in the comment section. Please post no URL or web links – let others play. No prize this week, so you’re playing for bragging rights only.

For more clues and other guessing fun, please visit the What is it? Blog. Good luck!

Update 5/1/09 – The answer is: An Electraply quack medical device, according to the manual, it’s a “pulsating machine used on the body for its therapeutic action and for administering electrical massage,” patent number 1,789,758. That was too easy! Congrats to jmjrdrave who got it first (and to Jared for a more detailed answer) ;)


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44 comments to "What Is It? Game 97"

  1. Gauldar
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:21 am

    It's an old massage roller. They kind used to extract milk from women's breasts to feed to their father who has cancer.

  2. rwblake
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:24 am

    Wall paper tool.

  3. artsnarf
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:26 am

    Wax applicator for type or copy, or a glue applicator for wood

  4. Randall
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:38 am

    This is a Bissel Wampner, for realligning the plimsol marks on military cargo ships. Incorrect plimsol marks led to leeward warpage, especially on the Great Lakes of America and the western Caspian Sea. Originally the task of alignment went to the newest or least popular member, but with the implementation of The Maritime Safety Act off 1963, the alignment is performed by a trained monkey, or for ships flagged by the British Isles, a welshman.

  5. jmjrdrave
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:42 am

    A spring loaded roller to keep a constant pressure on an uneven surface.No guess as to what that surface may be.

  6. Stolia
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:47 am

    Paint squirter / roller.

  7. Robert
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:55 am

    What ever it is, Randall gets the most creative answer. I'd hate to be the newbie.

  8. jmjrdrave
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:57 am

    apparatus for use in electrotherapeutics.

  9. zander
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:03 am

    Steampunk ink roller

  10. AJ
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:11 am

    This is the prior art I need to finally break the design patent Nestle holds on (ice cream) Push Up Pops.

    Children of the world rejoice! Inexpensive mess-free ice cream awaits you this summer!

    Ha ha, just kidding. I'll piddle my life's savings away in court for another decade and die penniless clutching a naked Barbie doll in an alley in Levittown, New York.

  11. zander
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:13 am

    piano's foot.

  12. Craig
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:24 am

    A hanging scale (you know, like...for weighing fish)

  13. Jared
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:34 am

    It is an Electreat apparatus, a neuromodulatory device for the relief of pain and improved vitality and health.

    Y'all can bow to the neuroscientist now :p

  14. Jared
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:35 am

    (Also known as the Electreat Mechanical Heart)

  15. Tom
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:43 am

    It's an ancient Swedish penis pump.

    And it's not mine, Baby, I swear it!

  16. iamgorman
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:52 am

    Its used to make soil plugs to start seedlings.

  17. Brad VW
    April 30th, 2009 at 9:53 am

    I'd have to agree with #6 Stolia, but I would add that it's specifically for street and highway strip painting.

  18. Robster
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:02 am

    Pastry tool

  19. Jay
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:04 am

    it's a glue applicator/roller

  20. Jason McElroy
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:19 am

    It's clearly one leg to old-fashioned bed frame. Before the technology existed for springs embedded in mattresses, they used spring-loaded legs on the frames.

    This one is, of course, the Deluxe model which can be rolled away from the wall when using the latest space age dust sucking machine (pre-Hoover).

  21. Frau
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:21 am

    It looks like the roller used for tanning leather hide.

  22. Javier Soria
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:21 am

    This object is a roller to paint the fingers in a central police when the police will take fingerprints.I have seen many years ago, lol

  23. Craig
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:21 am

    It's an insecticide sprayer?

  24. Craig
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:22 am

    An early style ink press roller?

  25. f-1
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:24 am

    a medieval penis pump

  26. Craig
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:25 am

    Holy crap...the web image of an electreat apparatus does indeed look almost exactly like the device pictured above!

  27. Craig
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:26 am

    http://www.chss.montclair.edu/~pererat/q_eltr.jpg

  28. atomburke
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:42 am

    bug/ddt sprayer

  29. Dail
    April 30th, 2009 at 10:43 am

    It's a roller. It's used for rolling.

  30. Elizabeth
    April 30th, 2009 at 11:03 am

    An envelope sealer, with maybe a stamp dispenser inside?

  31. Penultimate
    April 30th, 2009 at 11:27 am

    my guess would be an early type of printing press.

  32. theonlyowen
    April 30th, 2009 at 12:30 pm

    This is an electrical device that takes d-batteries. You move the metal switch down to turn it on. It produces a an electrical charge when both your hands touch. (it's used for therapy stimulation of electrical connections)

  33. BikerRay
    April 30th, 2009 at 2:21 pm

    Craig - well found. "Electreat apparatus (1928-1938) Cylinder with roller on end, containing two flashlight cells; accessories included sponge, scalp brush, palm massage pad." Also, "A battery-operated device called the "Electreat" for giving a harmless electric shock. Before the manufacturer was enjoined by the Food & Drug Administration, Electreat was represented as helpful for goiter, kidney trouble, heart pain, broken bones, childbirth paralysis and deafness."

  34. Alan Edwards
    April 30th, 2009 at 2:26 pm

    It is part of a door closure mechanism, goes under the name of dictator.

    Well it might be.

  35. Dylan
    April 30th, 2009 at 2:49 pm

    This is the leg of an upright piano.

  36. villalba
    April 30th, 2009 at 3:54 pm

    This is a manual bomb deployment system. When your army doesn't have enough planes to bomb a city, you deploy your troops, each soldier carrying one of this things, to the target city. Once your troops arrive at the target location, they throw them as if they were throwing a hammer (olympic kind, not regular hammer, that would be just ridiculous) towards the roof of the target building.

    Not pictured: see the little hole between the handle and the bomb? That's where the safety pin goes.

  37. monia
    April 30th, 2009 at 4:44 pm

    My son says it's an antique robot leg.

  38. Tom
    April 30th, 2009 at 4:46 pm

    Or it's a futuristic pirate leg!

  39. Craig
    April 30th, 2009 at 8:29 pm

    I should apologize. I just remembered we're not supposed to link to anything on the guessing board. ...my bad.

  40. rokkomi
    May 1st, 2009 at 3:52 am

    Insecticide spraying device.

  41. Jared
    May 1st, 2009 at 6:03 am

    @33... Ahem (post 13)

    :p

  42. Craig
    May 1st, 2009 at 5:42 pm

    @41... Ahem (post 8)

    :p

  43. Jim
    May 3rd, 2009 at 10:36 pm

    It's a spool guide for a paper machine. when paper is produced industrially, steam filled rollers about 5 foot in diameter are used to dry the pulp and form it into a long continuous sheet. these rollers are used to guide the edges as it is in a dry state and being spooled

  44. Alex
    May 7th, 2009 at 12:50 pm

    test


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