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Mechanical Watch

ciechanow.ski

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Re: Mechanical Watch

#291

Post by alanbernstein »

I always enjoy reading these, but this one is special for me because it relates to two back burner projects I'm thinking about recently:

1. building a custom mechanical timer, which I want for practical use.

2. designing a real-world alethiometer - a fictional watch/compass device with chaotic (magical) behavior - which runs entirely on clockwork. I've been wondering how to incorporate a source of significant entropy into a watch movement. One idea, for example, is something like a double pendulum, but made from torsion springs.

Re: Mechanical Watch

#294

Post by ThePhysicist »

grishka wrote: post #265
ThePhysicist wrote: post #31

I was curious how he did those visualizations so I looked at the source code. Turns out he codes everything by hand in WebGL [1]. Absolutely impressive stuff. Source code is non-minified so you can have a look and understand everything as well. [1]: https://ciechanow.ski/js/watch.js

Are you sure about the by hand part? There's a lot of repetition, it feels like at least some of it must be generated.

There is repetition but it doesn't look auto-generated to me.

Re: Mechanical Watch

#295

Post by DeathArrow »

brchr wrote: post #273
cyounkins wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I started working around pulsed high voltage last year (100kV+) and now it loses a couple minutes a week. Are these two things somehow related to one another?

Watch movements are generally sensitive to magnetic fields, and can become magnetized and lose accuracy. Some watch models explicitly advertise their level of resistance to magnetism, for instance the Rolex Milgauss, which is designed to withstand 1,000 ("mille") gauss.

Omega has watches that are METAS certified, so they resist up to 15000 gauss. They use silicon balance and silicon escapement.

Re: Mechanical Watch

#296

Post by hoseja »

Ancapistani wrote: post #79
NoGravitas wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an automatic mechanical watch - a Seiko 5. It loses about 5 minutes a day. It might only need an adjustment to calibrate it, but that would require a watchmaker. I think the last one in town just went out of business, and even if he hadn't, the cost of his labor would be greater than the cost of the watch.

It's not hard to make the adjustment, but you need a timegrapher to measure the results in a reasonable time. I've adjusted a couple of my watches over the course of a week or two by making small adjustments, noting the time, wearing it for a day, and then noting how much the time had changed versus a "known good" time. It's a pain but doable. There are mobile apps that use the phone's microphone to measure the watch…

Why wouldn't they be accurate? You have a fairly precise 44kHz sampling rate, the only issue might be identifying the ticks.

Re: Mechanical Watch

#297

Post by dncornholio »

andai wrote: post #279
kragen wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That looks like a fair bit of boilerplate, and a shitty tutorial with comments that mostly just repeat what the code says, but the API doesn't look unusable. https://github.com/patriciogonzalezvivo/glslCanvas/blob/mast... has most of that same boilerplate in a less repulsive form. https://github.com/patriciogonzalezvivo/glslCanvas/blob/mast... has other bits.

Now compare it with Flash ;)

ActionScript was fucking great. :(

Re: Mechanical Watch

#299

Post by rusticpenn »

_fat_santa wrote: post #2

There's something magical about mechanical watches. Maybe it's just knowing that you have this perpetually winding machine on your hand (in the case of "automatic" mechanical watches). Also knowing that the thing will last forever, take care of it and it will probably outlive you. Can't say that about an Apple Watch. If you want a good mechanical watch that won't break the bank I suggest picking up a Seiko SKX (thoug…

Not to defend Apple watch or other smart watches, but they have been my dream since my childhood watching James Bond movies. So I love both mechanical watches for their engineering and smart watches for what they bring to the table. We dont have to diss one to make the other feel better.

Re: Mechanical Watch

#300

Post by Prcmaker »

DeathArrow wrote: post #283
Prcmaker wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been using the same mechanical watch, more or less every day, for a little over 12yrs now. Miyota movement, stainless body, Sapphire window, about $300. In years of machine shop work the movement survived fine, and has one scratch on window from some tungsten carbide. Has kept brilliant time, maybe a minute a month, and taught me that my watch being accurate to the second was something that, for me, just didn't…

> I started working around pulsed high voltage last year (100kV+) and now it loses a couple minutes a week. There are antimagnetic watches. Or you can use a cheap watch demagnetizer.

A demagnetizer is on the shopping list, but at the same time, a quick adjustment every now and then is easy enough. I also love my watch, so a switch to antimagnetic isn't high on my priorities.
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