2009/4/27 Jerome & Elizabeth Moos <jerrymoos@sbcglobal.net>:
> As Jay and I were discussing offlist, Elaedy and Nortex and maybe some others were made by Tron & Berthet, the makers of Ideale. In fact, if you change the final "Y" to and "I", then Elaedy(i) is Ideale spelled backwards. I think BIM must have been a T & B brand also, as one sees model 39's marked as either Ideale or BIM. Jay has some catalogs which seem to indicate that Elaedy was a second tier line and Nortex third tier. Oddly, I recently saw one model offfered on eBay, mod 63 or some such, both in Ideale and Elaedy versions. I don't know if there was a difference in quality or original price between the two.
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It looks as though the hierarchy chez T&B, at least at the reported mid-30s date of the following bit of Ideale ephemera just sold on ebay for US 14.99,...
or
http://picasaweb.google.com/
^more permanent link for archives
...runs from top to bottom: Ideale, Elaedy, Nortox and the forgotten and maligned Lion :D
(assuming my interpretation of the image linked to is correct!)
Kurt Sperry
Bellingham, Washington
USA