[time-nuts] Non electrical time-nuttery

[Bob Camp]

Hi

If you abandoned the non-elecronic side of the requirement, you could hit it with a pulsed LED and probably get phase data off of a couple of photo detectors.

Crazy stuff ...

Bob


On Jan 9, 2010, at 6:21 PM, J. Forster wrote:

> Maybe you could "pump" the pendulum optically, using a beam of light, like
> those glass bulb "radiometers" they sell that spin on a sunny window
> ledge.
> 
> -John
> 
> =============
> 
> 
> 
>> Like a magnetically coupled escapement
>> Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Bob Camp <lists at cq.nu>
>> Date: Sat, 9 Jan 2010 12:36:11
>> To: Discussion of precise time and frequency
>> measurement<time-nuts at febo.com>
>> Subject: Re: [time-nuts] Non electrical time-nuttery
>> 
>> Hi
>> 
>> How about a rotary pendulum on a quartz fiber spring with some kind of
>> trick magnets to drive it  / read it out? Put the pendulum and spring
>> inside an evacuated glass envelope to get around the vacuum pump issue.
>> The enclosure could be pretty small.
>> 
>> Drive the magnets with a second external clock, and feedback compensate
>> it. Let the external clock do all the readout via a very normal gear and
>> pointers system. The trick would be getting the feedback loop to work
>> purely mechanically with enough gain to "unload" the master pendulum.
>> 
>> Bob
>> 
>> 
>> On Jan 9, 2010, at 2:07 PM, Lux, Jim (337C) wrote:
>> 
>>> OK.. So we're moving back in electrical technology....
>>> But what about mechanical?  Could modern technology get a substantial
>>> (>order of magnitude) improvement over 19th century chronometers (either
>>> pendulum or balance wheel or whatever).  I know there's some really good
>>> quartz fiber torsional spring schemes, but I think they still need
>>> electrical means to keep them moving and to read it out.
>>> 
>>> So how good can one do with a mechanical, hydraulic, (or chemical, I
>>> suppose) system?  Let's assume it has to have a "direct" readout that is
>>> human readable by a causal bystander.  (this starts to sound like the
>>> 10,000 year clock or whatever it is..)
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>> 
>> 
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> 
> 
> 
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