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1 Mudge, Thomas
SUBJECT AREA: Horology[br]b. 1715 Exeter, Englandd. 14 November 1794 Walworth, England[br]English clock-and watchmaker who invented the lever escapement that was ultimately used in all mechanical watches.[br]Thomas Mudge was the son of a clergyman and schoolmaster who, recognizing his son's mechanical aptitude, apprenticed him to the eminent London clock-and watchmaker George Graham. Mudge became free of the Clockmakers' Company in 1738 and set up on his own account after Graham's death in 1751. Around 1755 he formed a partnership with William Dutton, another apprentice of Graham. The firm produced conventional clocks and watches of excellent quality, but Mudge had also established a reputation for making highly innovative individual pieces. The most significant of these was the watch with a detached-lever escapement that he completed in 1770, although the idea had occurred to him as early as 1754. This watch was purchased by George III for Queen Charlotte and is still in the Royal Collection. Shortly afterwards Mudge moved to Plymouth, to devote his time to the perfection of the marine chronometer, leaving the London business in the hands of Dutton. The chronometers he produced were comparable in performance to those of John Harrison, but like them they were too complicated and expensive to be produced in quantity.Mudge's patron, Count Bruhl, recognized the potential of the detached-lever escapement, but Mudge was too involved with his marine chronometers to make a watch for him. He did, however, provide Bruhl with a large-scale model of his escapement, from which the Swiss expatriate Josiah Emery was able to make a watch in 1782. Over the next decade Emery made a limited number of similar watches for wealthy clients, and it was the performance of these watches that demonstrated the worth of the escapement. The detached-lever escapement took some time to be adopted universally, but this was facilitated in the nineteenth century by the development of a cheaper form, the pin lever.By the end of the century the detached-lever escapement was used in one form or another in practically all mechanical watches and portable clocks. If a watch is to be a good timekeeper the balance must be free to swing with as little interference as possible from the escapement. In this respect the cylinder escapement is an improvement on the verge, although it still exerts a frictional force on the balance. The lever escapement is a further improvement because it detaches itself from the balance after delivering the impulse which keeps it oscillating.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsClockmaker to George III 1776.Further ReadingT.Mudge, Jr, 1799, A Description with Plates of the Time-Keeper Invented by the Late Mr. Thomas Mudge, London (contains a tract written by his father and the text of his letters to Count Bruhl).C.Clutton and G.Daniels, 1986, Watches, 4th edn, London (provides further biographical information and a good account of the history of the lever watch).R.Good, 1978, Britten's Watch \& Clock Maker's Handbook Dictionary and Guide, 16th edn, London, pp. 190–200 (provides a good technical description of Mudge's lever escapement and its later development).DV -
2 Huygens, Christiaan
SUBJECT AREA: Horology[br]b. 14 April 1629 The Hague, the Netherlandsd. 8 June 1695 The Hague, the Netherlands[br]Dutch scientist who was responsible for two of the greatest advances in horology: the successful application of both the pendulum to the clock and the balance spring to the watch.[br]Huygens was born into a cultured and privileged class. His father, Constantijn, was a poet and statesman who had wide interests. Constantijn exerted a strong influence on his son, who was educated at home until he reached the age of 16. Christiaan studied law and mathematics at Ley den University from 1645 to 1647, and continued his studies at the Collegium Arausiacum in Breda until 1649. He then lived at The Hague, where he had the means to devote his time entirely to study. In 1666 he became a Member of the Académie des Sciences in Paris and settled there until his return to The Hague in 1681. He also had a close relationship with the Royal Society and visited London on three occasions, meeting Newton on his last visit in 1689. Huygens had a wide range of interests and made significant contributions in mathematics, astronomy, optics and mechanics. He also made technical advances in optical instruments and horology.Despite the efforts of Burgi there had been no significant improvement in the performance of ordinary clocks and watches from their inception to Huygens's time, as they were controlled by foliots or balances which had no natural period of oscillation. The pendulum appeared to offer a means of improvement as it had a natural period of oscillation that was almost independent of amplitude. Galileo Galilei had already pioneered the use of a freely suspended pendulum for timing events, but it was by no means obvious how it could be kept swinging and used to control a clock. Towards the end of his life Galileo described such a. mechanism to his son Vincenzio, who constructed a model after his father's death, although it was not completed when he himself died in 1642. This model appears to have been copied in Italy, but it had little influence on horology, partly because of the circumstances in which it was produced and possibly also because it differed radically from clocks of that period. The crucial event occurred on Christmas Day 1656 when Huygens, quite independently, succeeded in adapting an existing spring-driven table clock so that it was not only controlled by a pendulum but also kept it swinging. In the following year he was granted a privilege or patent for this clock, and several were made by the clockmaker Salomon Coster of The Hague. The use of the pendulum produced a dramatic improvement in timekeeping, reducing the daily error from minutes to seconds, but Huygens was aware that the pendulum was not truly isochronous. This error was magnified by the use of the existing verge escapement, which made the pendulum swing through a large arc. He overcame this defect very elegantly by fitting cheeks at the pendulum suspension point, progressively reducing the effective length of the pendulum as the amplitude increased. Initially the cheeks were shaped empirically, but he was later able to show that they should have a cycloidal shape. The cheeks were not adopted universally because they introduced other defects, and the problem was eventually solved more prosaically by way of new escapements which reduced the swing of the pendulum. Huygens's clocks had another innovatory feature: maintaining power, which kept the clock going while it was being wound.Pendulums could not be used for portable timepieces, which continued to use balances despite their deficiencies. Robert Hooke was probably the first to apply a spring to the balance, but his efforts were not successful. From his work on the pendulum Huygens was well aware of the conditions necessary for isochronism in a vibrating system, and in January 1675, with a flash of inspiration, he realized that this could be achieved by controlling the oscillations of the balance with a spiral spring, an arrangement that is still used in mechanical watches. The first model was made for Huygens in Paris by the clockmaker Isaac Thuret, who attempted to appropriate the invention and patent it himself. Huygens had for many years been trying unsuccessfully to adapt the pendulum clock for use at sea (in order to determine longitude), and he hoped that a balance-spring timekeeper might be better suited for this purpose. However, he was disillusioned as its timekeeping proved to be much more susceptible to changes in temperature than that of the pendulum clock.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsFRS 1663. Member of the Académie Royale des Sciences 1666.BibliographyFor his complete works, see Oeuvres complètes de Christian Huygens, 1888–1950, 22 vols, The Hague.1658, Horologium, The Hague; repub., 1970, trans. E.L.Edwardes, AntiquarianHorology 7:35–55 (describes the pendulum clock).1673, Horologium Oscillatorium, Paris; repub., 1986, The Pendulum Clock or Demonstrations Concerning the Motion ofPendula as Applied to Clocks, trans.R.J.Blackwell, Ames.The balance spring watch was first described in Journal des Sçavans 25 February 1675, and translated in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society (1675) 4:272–3.Further ReadingH.J.M.Bos, 1972, Dictionary of Scientific Biography, ed. C.C.Gillispie, Vol. 6, New York, pp. 597–613 (for a fuller account of his life and scientific work, but note the incorrect date of his death).R.Plomp, 1979, Spring-Driven Dutch Pendulum Clocks, 1657–1710, Schiedam (describes Huygens's application of the pendulum to the clock).S.A.Bedini, 1991, The Pulse of Time, Florence (describes Galileo's contribution of the pendulum to the clock).J.H.Leopold, 1982, "L"Invention par Christiaan Huygens du ressort spiral réglant pour les montres', Huygens et la France, Paris, pp. 154–7 (describes the application of the balance spring to the watch).A.R.Hall, 1978, "Horology and criticism", Studia Copernica 16:261–81 (discusses Hooke's contribution).DV -
3 horlogerie
horlogerie [ɔʀlɔʒʀi]feminine noun( = secteur) watch-making* * *ɔʀlɔʒʀinom féminin ( industrie) watchmaking; ( boutique) watchmaker's (shop); ( produits) clocks and watches (pl)* * *ɔʀlɔʒʀi nf1) (= activité) watchmakingpièces d'horlogerie — watch parts, watch components
2) (= boutique) shop selling clocks and watches* * *horlogerie ⇒ Les métiers et les professions nf ( industrie) watchmaking; ( boutique) watchmaker's (shop); ( produits) clocks and watches (pl); pièce d'horlogerie watch component.[ɔrlɔʒri] nom féminin1. [technique, métier] clock (and watch) ou timepiece makinga. [interne] clock componentb. [horloge] timepiece -
4 Barlow, Edward
SUBJECT AREA: Horology[br]baptized 15 December 1636 near Warrington, Cheshire, England d. 1716[br]English priest and mechanician who invented rack striking, repeating mechanisms for clocks and watches and, with others, patented a horizontal escapement for watches.[br]Barlow was the son of Edward Booth, but he adopted the surname of his godfather, the Benedictine monk Ambrose Barlow, as a condition of his will. In 1659 he entered the English College at Lisbon, and after being ordained a priest he was sent to the English mission. There he resided at Parkhall in Lancashire, the seat of Mr Houghton, with whom he later collaborated on the horizontal escapement.At a time when it was difficult to produce a light to examine the dial of a clock or watch at night, a mechanism that would indicate the hours and subdivisions of the hour audibly and at will was highly desirable. The count wheel, which had been used from the earliest times to control the striking of a clock, was unsuitable for this purpose as it struck the hours in sequence. If the mechanism was set off manually to determine the time, the strike would no longer correspond with the indications on the dial. In 1675 Barlow invented rack striking, where the hour struck was determined solely by the position of the hour hand. With this mechanism it was therefore possible to repeat the hour at will, without upsetting the sequence of striking. In 1687 Barlow tried to patent a method of repeating for watches, but it was rejected by James II in favour of a system produced by the watchmaker Daniel Quare and which was simpler to operate. He was successful in obtaining a patent for a horizontal escapement for watches in 1695, in collaboration with William Hough ton and Thomas Tompion. Although this escapement was little used, it can be regarded as the forerunner of the cylinder escapement that George Graham introduced c. 1725.[br]Bibliography1695 (with William Houghton and Thomas Tompion), British patent no. 344 (a horizontal escapement).Further ReadingDictionary of National Biography, 1885, Vol. 1, Oxford, S.V.Barlow.Britten's Old Clocks \& Watches and Their Makers, 1982, rev. Cecil Clutton, 9th edn, London, pp. 148, 310, 313 (provides a technical description of rack striking, repeating work and the horizontal escapement).DV -
5 Guillaume, Charles-Edouard
[br]b. 15 February 1861 Fleurier, Switzerlandd. 13 June 1938 Sèvres, France[br]Swiss physicist who developed two alloys, "invar" and "elinvar", used for the temperature compensation of clocks and watches.[br]Guillaume came from a family of clock-and watchmakers. He was educated at the Gymnasium in Neuchâtel and at Zurich Polytechnic, from which he received his doctorate in 1883 for a thesis on electrolytic capacitors. In the same year he joined the International Bureau of Weights and Measures at Sèvres in France, where he was to spend the rest of his working life. He retired as Director in 1936. At the bureau he was involved in distributing the national standards of the metre to countries subscribing to the General Conference on Weights and Measures that had been held in 1889. This made him aware of the crucial effect of thermal expansion on the lengths of the standards and he was prompted to look for alternative materials that would be less costly than the platinum alloys which had been used. While studying nickel steels he made the surprising discovery that the thermal expansion of certain alloy compositions was less than that of the constituent metals. This led to the development of a steel containing about 36 per cent nickel that had a very low thermal coefficient of expansion. This alloy was subsequently named "invar", an abbreviation of invariable. It was well known that changes in temperature affected the timekeeping of clocks by altering the length of the pendulum, and various attempts had been made to overcome this defect, most notably the mercury-compensated pendulum of Graham and the gridiron pendulum of Harrison. However, an invar pendulum offered a simpler and more effective method of temperature compensation and was used almost exclusively for pendulum clocks of the highest precision.Changes in temperature can also affect the timekeeping of watches and chronometers, but this is due mainly to changes in the elasticity or stiffness of the balance spring rather than to changes in the size of the balance itself. To compensate for this effect Guillaume developed another more complex nickel alloy, "elinvar" (elasticity invariable), whose elasticity remained almost constant with changes in temperature. This had two practical consequences: the construction of watches could be simplified (by using monometallic balances) and more accurate chronometers could be made.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsNobel Prize for Physics 1920. Corresponding member of the Académie des Sciences. Grand Officier de la Légion d'honneur 1937. Physical Society Duddell Medal 1928. British Horological Institute Gold Medal 1930.Bibliography1897, "Sur la dilation des aciers au nickel", Comptes rendus hebdomadaires des séances de l'Académie des sciences 124:176.1903, "Variations du module d"élasticité des aciers au nickel', Comptes rendushebdomadaires des séances de l'Académie des sciences 136:498."Les aciers au nickel et leurs applications à l'horlogerie", in J.Grossmann, Horlogerie théorique, Paris, Vol. II, pp. 361–414 (describes the application of invar and elinvar to horology).Sir Richard Glazebrook (ed.), 1923 "Invar and Elinvar", Dictionary of Applied Physics, 5 vols, London, Vol. V, pp. 320–7 (a succinct account in English).Further ReadingR.M.Hawthorne, 1989, Nobel Prize Winners, Physics, 1901–1937, ed. F.N.Magill, Pasadena, Salem Press, pp. 244–51.See also: Le Roy, PierreDVBiographical history of technology > Guillaume, Charles-Edouard
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6 Bain, Alexander
[br]b. October 1810 Watten, Scotlandd. 2 January 1877 Kirkintilloch, Scotland[br]Scottish inventor and entrepreneur who laid the foundations of electrical horology and designed an electromagnetic means of transmitting images (facsimile).[br]Alexander Bain was born into a crofting family in a remote part of Scotland. He was apprenticed to a watchmaker in Wick and during that time he was strongly influenced by a lecture on "Heat, sound and electricity" that he heard in nearby Thurso. This lecture induced him to take up a position in Clerkenwell in London, working as a journeyman clockmaker, where he was able to further his knowledge of electricity by attending lectures at the Adelaide Gallery and the Polytechnic Institution. His thoughts naturally turned to the application of electricity to clockmaking, and despite a bitter dispute with Charles Wheatstone over priority he was granted the first British patent for an electric clock. This patent, taken out on 11 January 1841, described a mechanism for an electric clock, in which an oscillating component of the clock operated a mechanical switch that initiated an electromagnetic pulse to maintain the regular, periodic motion. This principle was used in his master clock, produced in 1845. On 12 December of the same year, he patented a means of using electricity to control the operation of steam railway engines via a steam-valve. His earliest patent was particularly far-sighted and anticipated most of the developments in electrical horology that occurred during the nineteenth century. He proposed the use of electricity not only to drive clocks but also to distribute time over a distance by correcting the hands of mechanical clocks, synchronizing pendulums and using slave dials (here he was anticipated by Steinheil). However, he was less successful in putting these ideas into practice, and his electric clocks proved to be unreliable. Early electric clocks had two weaknesses: the battery; and the switching mechanism that fed the current to the electromagnets. Bain's earth battery, patented in 1843, overcame the first defect by providing a reasonably constant current to drive his clocks, but unlike Hipp he failed to produce a reliable switch.The application of Bain's numerous patents for electric telegraphy was more successful, and he derived most of his income from these. They included a patent of 12 December 1843 for a form of fax machine, a chemical telegraph that could be used for the transmission of text and of images (facsimile). At the receiver, signals were passed through a moving band of paper impregnated with a solution of ammonium nitrate and potassium ferrocyanide. For text, Morse code signals were used, and because the system could respond to signals faster than those generated by hand, perforated paper tape was used to transmit the messages; in a trial between Paris and Lille, 282 words were transmitted in less than one minute. In 1865 the Abbé Caselli, a French engineer, introduced a commercial fax service between Paris and Lyons, based on Bain's device. Bain also used the idea of perforated tape to operate musical wind instruments automatically. Bain squandered a great deal of money on litigation, initially with Wheatstone and then with Morse in the USA. Although his inventions were acknowledged, Bain appears to have received no honours, but when towards the end of his life he fell upon hard times, influential persons in 1873 secured for him a Civil List Pension of £80 per annum and the Royal Society gave him £150.[br]Bibliography1841, British patent no. 8,783; 1843, British patent no. 9,745; 1845, British patent no.10,838; 1847, British patent no. 11,584; 1852, British patent no. 14,146 (all for electric clocks).1852, A Short History of the Electric Clocks with Explanation of Their Principles andMechanism and Instruction for Their Management and Regulation, London; reprinted 1973, introd. W.Hackmann, London: Turner \& Devereux (as the title implies, this pamphlet was probably intended for the purchasers of his clocks).Further ReadingThe best account of Bain's life and work is in papers by C.A.Aked in Antiquarian Horology: "Electricity, magnetism and clocks" (1971) 7: 398–415; "Alexander Bain, the father of electrical horology" (1974) 9:51–63; "An early electric turret clock" (1975) 7:428–42. These papers were reprinted together (1976) in A Conspectus of Electrical Timekeeping, Monograph No. 12, Antiquarian Horological Society: Tilehurst.J.Finlaison, 1834, An Account of Some Remarkable Applications of the Electric Fluid to the Useful Arts by Alexander Bain, London (a contemporary account between Wheatstone and Bain over the invention of the electric clock).J.Munro, 1891, Heroes of the Telegraph, Religious Tract Society.J.Malster \& M.J.Bowden, 1976, "Facsimile. A Review", Radio \&Electronic Engineer 46:55.D.J.Weaver, 1982, Electrical Clocks and Watches, Newnes.T.Hunkin, 1993, "Just give me the fax", New Scientist (13 February):33–7 (provides details of Bain's and later fax devices).See also: Bakewell, Frederick C.DV / KF -
7 Brown, Joseph Rogers
SUBJECT AREA: Mechanical, pneumatic and hydraulic engineering[br]b. 26 January 1810 Warren, Rhode Island, USAd. 23 July 1876 Isles of Shoals, New Hampshire, USA[br]American machine-tool builder and co-founder of Brown \& Sharpe.[br]Joseph Rogers Brown was the eldest son of David Brown, who was modestly established as a maker of and dealer in clocks and watches. Joseph assisted his father during school vacations and at the age of 17 left to obtain training as a machinist. In 1829 he joined his father in the manufacture of tower clocks at Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and two years later went into business for himself in Pawtucket making lathes and small tools. In 1833 he rejoined his father in Providence, Rhode Island, as a partner in the manufacture of docks, watches and surveying and mathematical instruments. David Brown retired in 1841.J.R.Brown invented and built in 1850 a linear dividing engine which was the first automatic machine for graduating rules in the United States. In 1851 he brought out the vernier calliper, the first application of a vernier scale in a workshop measuring tool. Lucian Sharpe was taken into partnership in 1853 and the firm became J.R.Brown \& Sharpe; in 1868 the firm was incorporated as the Brown \& Sharpe Manufacturing Company.In 1855 Brown invented a precision gear-cutting machine to make clock gears. The firm obtained in 1861 a contract to make Wilcox \& Gibbs sewing machines and gave up the manufacture of clocks. At about this time F.W. Howe of the Providence Tool Company arranged for Brown \& Sharpe to make a turret lathe required for the manufacture of muskets. This was basically Howe's design, but Brown added a few features, and it was the first machine tool built for sale by the Brown \& Sharpe Company. It was followed in 1862 by the universal milling machine invented by Brown initially for making twist drills. Particularly for cutting gear teeth, Brown invented in 1864 a formed milling cutter which could be sharpened without changing its profile. In 1867 the need for an instrument for checking the thickness of sheet material became apparent, and in August of that year J.R.Brown and L.Sharpe visited the Paris Exhibition and saw a micrometer calliper invented by Jean Laurent Palmer in 1848. They recognized its possibilities and with a few developments marketed it as a convenient, hand-held measuring instrument. Grinding lathes were made by Brown \& Sharpe in the early 1860s, and from 1868 a universal grinding machine was developed, with the first one being completed in 1876. The patent for this machine was granted after Brown's sudden death while on holiday.[br]Further ReadingJ.W.Roe, 1916, English and American Tool Builders, New Haven: Yale University Press; repub. 1926, New York and 1987, Bradley, Ill.: Lindsay Publications Inc. (further details of Brown \& Sharpe Company and their products).R.S.Woodbury, 1958, History of the Gear-Cutting Machine, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press ——, 1959, History of the Grinding Machine, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.——, 1960, History of the Milling Machine, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.RTS -
8 saatçilik
"being a maker, seller or repairer of clocks or watches; making, selling, or repairing clocks or watches." -
9 Riefler, Sigmund
SUBJECT AREA: Horology[br]b. 9 August 1847 Maria Rain, Germanyd. 21 October 1912 Munich, Germany[br]German engineer who invented the precision clock that bears his name.[br]Riefler's father was a scientific-instrument maker and clockmaker who in 1841 had founded the firm of Clemens Riefler to make mathematical instruments. After graduating in engineering from the University of Munich Sigmund worked as a surveyor, but when his father died in 1876 he and his brothers ran the family firm. Sigmund was responsible for technical development and in this capacity he designed a new system of drawing-instruments which established the reputation of the firm. He also worked to improve the performance of the precision clock, and in 1889 he was granted a patent for a new form of escapement. This escapement succeeded in reducing the interference of the clock mechanism with the free swinging of the pendulum by impulsing the pendulum through its suspension strip. It proved to be the greatest advance in precision timekeeping since the introduction of the dead-beat escapement about two hundred years earlier. When the firm of Clemens Riefler began to produce clocks with this escapement in 1890, they replaced clocks with Graham's dead-beat escapement as the standard regulator for use in observatories and other applications where the highest precision was required. In 1901 a movement was fitted with electrical rewind and was encapsulated in an airtight case, at low pressure, so that the timekeeping was not affected by changes in barometric pressure. This became the standard practice for precision clocks. Although the accuracy of the Riefler clock was later surpassed by the Shortt free-pendulum clock and the quartz clock, it remained in production until 1965, by which time over six hundred instruments had been made.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsFranklin Institute John Scott Medal 1894. Honorary doctorate, University of Munich 1897. Vereins zur Förderung des Gewerbefleisses in Preussen Gold Medal 1900.Bibliography1907, Präzisionspendeluhren und Zeitdienstanlagen fürSternwarten, Munich (for a complete bibliography see D.Riefler below).Further ReadingD.Riefler, 1981, Riefler-Präzisionspendeluhren, Munich (the definitive work on Riefler and his clock).A.L.Rawlings, 1948, The Science of Clocks and Watches, 2nd edn; repub. 1974 (a technical assessment of the Riefler escapement in its historical context).See also: Marrison, Warren AlvinDV -
10 horloger
horloger, -ère [ɔʀlɔʒe, εʀ]masculine noun, feminine noun* * *
1.
- ère ɔʀlɔʒe, ɛʀ adjectif watchmaking (épith)
2.
nom masculin, féminin watchmaker* * *ɔʀlɔʒe, ɛʀ nm/f (-ère)* * *A adj watchmaking ( épith).B ⇒ Les métiers et les professions nm,f watchmaker.horloger bijoutier jewellerGB.————————, horlogère [ɔrlɔʒe, ɛr] nom masculin, nom féminin -
11 опаздывать
(на что-л.; к кому-л./чему-л.)
1) be late (for); be overdue
2) только несовер.; разг. be slow (of clocks or watches)* * ** * *be late; be overdue* * *latelinger -
12 опаздывать
(на что-л.; к кому-л./чему-л.)несовер. - опаздывать; совер. - опоздать1) be late (for); be overdue2) только несовер.; разг. be slow ( of clocks or watches) -
13 tagiktik
English Definition: (noun) light sound of consecutive drops; ticking of clocks and watches -
14 часы
сущ.Русское существительное часы имеет форму только множественного числа. Английские эквиваленты отличаются тем, что имеют форму единственного и множественного числа и тем, что часы различаются по обычному местоположению.1. clock — часы (обозначает любые часы, которые не носят при себе; сочетание o'clock употребляется только для указания времени на циферблате): a wall clock — настенные часы; a tower clock — башенные часы; a city clock — городские часы It is five o'clock by the Hall clock. — Часы на ратуше показывают пять.2. watch — часы (любые часы, которые можно носить при/на себе; форма множественного числа русского существительного часы соответствует единственному числу английского watch): a pocket watch — карманные часы; a wrist watch — наручные часы; by my watch — по моим часам/на моих часах; to set one's watch by the radio signal — поставить часы по радиосигналу My watch is on the table, it is fast (slow). — Мои часы на столе, они спешат (отстают). Lots and lots of clocks and watches have gone wrong. — Множество разнообразных часов ( ручных и настенных) сломались. -
15 Cady, Walter Guyton
[br]b. 10 December 1874 Providence, Rhode Island, USAd. 9 December 1974 Providence, Rhode Island, USA[br]American physicist renowned for his pioneering work on piezo-electricity.[br]After obtaining BSc and MSc degrees in physics at Brown University in 1896 and 1897, respectively, Cady went to Berlin, obtaining his PhD in 1900. Returning to the USA he initially worked for the US Coast and Geodetic Survey, but in 1902 he took up a post at the Wesleyan University, Connecticut, remaining as Professor of Physics from 1907 until his retirement in 1946. During the First World War he became interested in piezo-electricity as a result of attending a meeting on techniques for detecting submarines, and after the war he continued to work on the use of piezo-electricity as a transducer for generating sonar beams. In the process he discovered that piezo-electric materials, such as quartz, exhibited high-stability electrical resonance, and in 1921 he produced the first working piezo-electric resonator. This idea was subsequently taken up by George Washington Pierce and others, resulting in very stable oscillators and narrow-band filters that are widely used in the 1990s in radio communications, electronic clocks and watches.Internationally known for his work, Cady retired from his professorship in 1946, but he continued to work for the US Navy. From 1951 to 1955 he was a consultant and research associate at the California Institute of Technology, after which he returned to Providence to continue research at Brown, filing his last patent (one of over fifty) at the age of 93 years.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsPresident, Institute of Radio Engineers 1932. London Physical Society Duddell Medal. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Morris N.Liebmann Memorial Prize 1928.Bibliography28 January 1920, US patent no. 1,450,246 (piezo-electric resonator).1921, "The piezo-electric resonator", Physical Review 17:531. 1946, Piezoelectricity, New York: McGraw Hill (his classic work).Further ReadingB.Jaffe, W.R.Cooke \& H.Jaffe, 1971, Piezoelectric Ceramics.KF -
16 Marrison, Warren Alvin
[br]b. 21 May 1896 Inverary, Canadad. 27 March 1980 Palo Verdes Estates, California, USA[br]Canadian (naturalized American) electrical engineer, pioneer of the quartz clock.[br]Marrison received his high-school education at Kingston Collegiate Institute, Ontario, and in 1914 he entered Queen's University in Kingston. He graduated in Engineering Physics in 1920, his college career having been interrupted by war service in the Royal Flying Corps. During his service in the Flying Corps he worked on radio, and when he returned to Kingston he established his own transmitter. This interest in radio was later to influence his professional life.In 1921 he entered Harvard University, where he obtained an MA, and shortly afterwards he joined the Western Electric Company in New York to work on the recording of sound on film. In 1925 he transferred to Western Electric's Bell Laboratory, where he began what was to become his life's work: the development of frequency standards for radio transmission. In 1922 Cady had used the elastic vibration of a quartz crystal to control the frequency of a valve oscillator, but at that time there was no way of counting and displaying the number of vibrations as the frequency was too high. In 1927 Marrison succeeded in dividing the frequency electronically until it was low enough to drive a synchronous motor. Although his purpose was to determine the frequency accurately by counting the number of vibrations that occurred in a given time, he had incidentally produced the first quartz-crystal -ontrolled clock. The results were sufficiently encouraging for him to build an improved version the following year, specifically as a time and frequency standard.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsBritish Horological Institute Gold Medal 1947. Clockmakers' Company Tompion Medal 1955.Bibliography1928, with J.W.Horton, "Precision measurement of frequency", Proceedings of the Institute of Radio Engineers 16:137–54 (provides details of the original quartz clock, although it was not described as such).1930, "The crystal clock", Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 16:496–507 (describes the second clock).Further ReadingW.R.Topham, 1989, "Warren A.Marrison—pioneer of the quartz revolution", NAWCC Bulletin 31(2):126–34.J.D.Weaver, 1982, Electrical and Electronic Clocks and Watches, London (a technical assessment of his work on the quartz clock).DV -
17 Roberts, Richard
[br]b. 22 April 1789 Carreghova, Llanymynech, Montgomeryshire, Walesd. 11 March 1864 London, England[br]Welsh mechanical engineer and inventor.[br]Richard Roberts was the son of a shoemaker and tollkeeper and received only an elementary education at the village school. At the age of 10 his interest in mechanics was stimulated when he was allowed by the Curate, the Revd Griffith Howell, to use his lathe and other tools. As a young man Roberts acquired a considerable local reputation for his mechanical skills, but these were exercised only in his spare time. For many years he worked in the local limestone quarries, until at the age of 20 he obtained employment as a pattern-maker in Staffordshire. In the next few years he worked as a mechanic in Liverpool, Manchester and Salford before moving in 1814 to London, where he obtained employment with Henry Maudslay. In 1816 he set up on his own account in Manchester. He soon established a reputation there for gear-cutting and other general engineering work, especially for the textile industry, and by 1821 he was employing about twelve men. He built machine tools mainly for his own use, including, in 1817, one of the first planing machines.One of his first inventions was a gas meter, but his first patent was obtained in 1822 for improvements in looms. His most important contribution to textile technology was his invention of the self-acting spinning mule, patented in 1825. The normal fourteen-year term of this patent was extended in 1839 by a further seven years. Between 1826 and 1828 Roberts paid several visits to Alsace, France, arranging cottonspinning machinery for a new factory at Mulhouse. By 1826 he had become a partner in the firm of Sharp Brothers, the company then becoming Sharp, Roberts \& Co. The firm continued to build textile machinery, and in the 1830s it built locomotive engines for the newly created railways and made one experimental steam-carriage for use on roads. The partnership was dissolved in 1843, the Sharps establishing a new works to continue locomotive building while Roberts retained the existing factory, known as the Globe Works, where he soon after took as partners R.G.Dobinson and Benjamin Fothergill (1802–79). This partnership was dissolved c. 1851, and Roberts continued in business on his own for a few years before moving to London as a consulting engineer.During the 1840s and 1850s Roberts produced many new inventions in a variety of fields, including machine tools, clocks and watches, textile machinery, pumps and ships. One of these was a machine controlled by a punched-card system similar to the Jacquard loom for punching rivet holes in plates. This was used in the construction of the Conway and Menai Straits tubular bridges. Roberts was granted twenty-six patents, many of which, before the Patent Law Amendment Act of 1852, covered more than one invention; there were still other inventions he did not patent. He made his contribution to the discussion which led up to the 1852 Act by publishing, in 1830 and 1833, pamphlets suggesting reform of the Patent Law.In the early 1820s Roberts helped to establish the Manchester Mechanics' Institute, and in 1823 he was elected a member of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester. He frequently contributed to their proceedings and in 1861 he was made an Honorary Member. He was elected a Member of the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1838. From 1838 to 1843 he served as a councillor of the then-new Municipal Borough of Manchester. In his final years, without the assistance of business partners, Roberts suffered financial difficulties, and at the time of his death a fund for his aid was being raised.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsMember, Institution of Civil Engineers 1838.Further ReadingThere is no full-length biography of Richard Roberts but the best account is H.W.Dickinson, 1945–7, "Richard Roberts, his life and inventions", Transactions of the Newcomen Society 25:123–37.W.H.Chaloner, 1968–9, "New light on Richard Roberts, textile engineer (1789–1864)", Transactions of the Newcomen Society 41:27–44.RTS -
18 saatçi
maker, seller, or repairer of clocks or watches. -
19 Graham, George
SUBJECT AREA: Horology[br]b. c.1674 Cumberland, Englandd. 16 November 1751 London, England[br]English watch-and clockmaker who invented the cylinder escapement for watches, the first successful dead-beat escapement for clocks and the mercury compensation pendulum.[br]Graham's father died soon after his birth, so he was raised by his brother. In 1688 he was apprenticed to the London clockmaker Henry Aske, and in 1695 he gained his freedom. He was employed as a journeyman by Tompion in 1696 and later married his niece. In 1711 he formed a partnership with Tompion and effectively ran the business in Tompion's declining years; he took over the business after Tompion died in 1713. In addition to his horological interests he also made scientific instruments, specializing in those for astronomical use. As a person, he was well respected and appears to have lived up to the epithet "Honest George Graham". He befriended John Harrison when he first went to London and lent him money to further his researches at a time when they might have conflicted with his own interests.The two common forms of escapement in use in Graham's time, the anchor escapement for clocks and the verge escapement for watches, shared the same weakness: they interfered severely with the free oscillation of the pendulum and the balance, and thus adversely affected the timekeeping. Tompion's two frictional rest escapements, the dead-beat for clocks and the horizontal for watches, had provided a partial solution by eliminating recoil (the momentary reversal of the motion of the timepiece), but they had not been successful in practice. Around 1720 Graham produced his own much improved version of the dead-beat escapement which became a standard feature of regulator clocks, at least in Britain, until its supremacy was challenged at the end of the nineteenth century by the superior accuracy of the Riefler clock. Another feature of the regulator clock owed to Graham was the mercury compensation pendulum, which he invented in 1722 and published four years later. The bob of this pendulum contained mercury, the surface of which rose or fell with changes in temperature, compensating for the concomitant variation in the length of the pendulum rod. Graham devised his mercury pendulum after he had failed to achieve compensation by means of the difference in expansion between various metals. He then turned his attention to improving Tompion's horizontal escapement, and by 1725 the cylinder escapement existed in what was virtually its final form. From the following year he fitted this escapement to all his watches, and it was also used extensively by London makers for their precision watches. It proved to be somewhat lacking in durability, but this problem was overcome later in the century by using a ruby cylinder, notably by Abraham Louis Breguet. It was revived, in a cheaper form, by the Swiss and the French in the nineteenth century and was produced in vast quantities.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsFRS 1720. Master of the Clockmakers' Company 1722.BibliographyGraham contributed many papers to the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, in particular "A contrivance to avoid the irregularities in a clock's motion occasion'd by the action of heat and cold upon the rod of the pendulum" (1726) 34:40–4.Further ReadingBritten's Watch \& Clock Maker's Handbook Dictionary and Guide, 1978, rev. Richard Good, 16th edn, London, pp. 81, 84, 232 (for a technical description of the dead-beat and cylinder escapements and the mercury compensation pendulum).A.J.Turner, 1972, "The introduction of the dead-beat escapement: a new document", Antiquarian Horology 8:71.E.A.Battison, 1972, biography, Biographical Dictionary of Science, ed. C.C.Gillespie, Vol. V, New York, 490–2 (contains a résumé of Graham's non-horological activities).DV -
20 Tompion, Thomas
SUBJECT AREA: Horology[br]baptized 25 July 1639 Ickwell Green, Englandd. 20 November 1713 London, England[br]English clock-and watchmaker of great skill and ingenuity who laid the foundations of his country's pre-eminence in that field.[br]Little is known about Tompion's early life except that he was born into a family of blacksmiths. When he was admitted into the Clockmakers' Company in 1671 he was described as a "Great Clockmaker", which meant a maker of turret clocks, and as these clocks were made of wrought iron they would have required blacksmithing skills. Despite this background, he also rapidly established his reputation as a watchmaker. In 1674 he moved to premises in Water Lane at the sign of "The Dial and Three Crowns", where his business prospered and he remained for the rest of his life. Assisted by journeymen and up to eleven apprentices at any one time, the output from his workshop was prodigious, amounting to over 5,000 watches and 600 clocks. In his lifetime he was famous for his watches, as these figures suggest, but although they are of high quality they do not differ markedly from those produced by other London watchmakers of that period. He is now known more for the limited number of elaborate clocks that he produced, such as the equation clock and the spring-driven clock of a year's duration, which he made for William III. Around 1711 he took into partnership his nephew by marriage, George Graham, who carried on the business after his death.Although Tompion does not seem to have been particularly innovative, he lived at a time when great advances were being made in horology, which his consummate skill as a craftsman enabled him to exploit. In this he was greatly assisted by his association with Robert Hooke, for whom Tompion constructed a watch with a balance spring in 1675; at that time Hooke was trying to establish his priority over Huygens for this invention. Although this particular watch was not successful, it made Tompion aware of the potential of the balance spring and he became the first person in England to apply Huygens's spiral spring to the balance of a watch. Although Thuret had constructed such a watch somewhat earlier in France, the superior quality of Tompion's wheel work, assisted by Hooke's wheel-cutting engine, enabled him to dominate the market. The anchor escapement (which reduced the amplitude of the pendulum's swing) was first applied to clocks around this time and produced further improvements in accuracy which Tompion and other makers were able to utilize. However, the anchor escapement, like the verge escapement, produced recoil (the clock was momentarily driven in reverse). Tompion was involved in attempts to overcome this defect with the introduction of the dead-beat escapement for clocks and the horizontal escapement for watches. Neither was successful, but they were both perfected later by George Graham.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsMaster of the Clockmakers' Company 1703.Bibliography1695, with William Houghton and Edward Barlow, British patent no. 344 (for a horizontal escapement).Further ReadingR.W.Symonds, 1951, Thomas Tompion, His Life and Work, London (a comprehensive but now slightly dated account).H.W.Robinson and W.Adams (eds), 1935, The Diary of Robert Hooke (contains many references to Tompion).D.Howse, 1970, The Tompion clocks at Greenwich and the dead-beat escapement', Antiquarian Horology 7:18–34, 114–33.DV
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