Episode 3 of 3
Abandonment of Construction
- When
- 1842
- Where
- British Government
The British government abandoned the project in 1842 after Babbage spent over £17,000 without a working engine.
The project failed to achieve a working engine despite significant expenditure. Babbage's attention had shifted to the analytical engine, undermining confidence in the difference engine's success. The government viewed the project as an utter failure.
Sources
- Difference engine Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-29
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.