[time-nuts] Greek clocks - planets rather than seconds

Tom Harris celephicus at gmail.com
Mon May 11 15:56:06 EDT 2015


Good question. I intrigued me so I researched it. To make gears the Greek
craftsmen made a circular blank, then marked it out for the correct number
of teeth, probably using dividers, then filed the teeth with a triangular
needle file Analysis of the Antikythera Mechanism shows the sort of
irregularities that this method would give, Michael Wright made gears this
way to prove it. The teeth have a 60 degree angle and are triangular in
profile, which is not very efficient, but good enough for a clock. I made a
pair of gears this way, it took half a day but it worked.

Thanks for the link.


Tom Harris <celephicus at gmail.com>

On 11 May 2015 at 10:32, Hal Murray <hmurray at megapathdsl.net> wrote:

> Michael Wright talking about the Antikythera
>   http://www.the-eg.com/videos/michael-wright-antikythera-resurrector-eg8
>
> The video is 1/2 hour.  I thought it was good.  He's a colorful speaker.
>
> Anybody know how they made gears back then?  Or machinery in general?  What
> did they use for a file?  How did they make files?
>
>
> The Computer History Museum is having an event:
>
> May 13, 2015  10:30 AM
> Secrets of the Antikythera Mechanism
>   http://www.computerhistory.org/events/upcoming/
>
>  In 1900, sponge divers off the coast of the tiny Greek island of
> Antikythera
> made an astonishing discovery: the wreck of an ancient Roman ship lay 200
> feet beneath the water, its dazzling cargo spread out over the ocean floor.
> Among the life-size statues and amphorae was an encrusted piece of metal,
> which after nearly a century of investigation, is finally revealing its
> secrets....
>
>
> --
> These are my opinions.  I hate spam.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts at febo.com
> To unsubscribe, go to
> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts
> and follow the instructions there.
>


More information about the time-nuts mailing list