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Making a watch from scratch
- weinzierl 2y agoIn the 90s a friend of mine made a watch that just showed the year. The year precisely, that is to say, considering leap seconds. This is much harder than it sounds because the protocol used (DCF) transmits the leap year info spread out over a time span before the year change. So suddenly your stupid receiver + display needs memory and compute.
- LinuxAmbulance 2y agoHow large of a watch was it? Digital, I take it?
- userbinator 2y agoTruly deserving of the title "watchmaker".
- hoseja 2y agoIt's also possible to make synthetic ruby yourself.
- pwillia7 2y agohaha that was my first question/thought
- ktm5j 2y agoAnyone who's into this kind of thing would probably dig watching Clickspring: https://www.youtube.com/@Clickspring https://www.youtube.com/@Clickspring
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- xdennis 2y agoSpecifically this playlist where he builds a desk clock in an estimated 1000 hours: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8Y146v8HxE&list=PLZioPDnFPNsETq9h35dgQq80Ryx-beOli&index=1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8Y146v8HxE&list=PLZioPDnFPN... The last video in the series summaries everything in 12 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dU7iKNmQBIs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dU7iKNmQBIs
- LinuxAmbulance 2y agoOne of the best Youtube channels in existence, fantastic work.
- aanet 2y agoThanks! new to me... And so awesome!
- _yb2s 2y agoAmazing work! I wear mechanical watches, and find them not to be "outdated technology" as a lot of people assume. My automatic skeleton watch requires no winding, batteries, or charging, which makes it a more practical way to tell time than an electronic watch in my opinion. I suppose one could argue that a solar powered quartz watch is even more practical for the same reasons... but the automatic is nearly the same in practice, and is a lot more fun, and looks cooler.
- tombert 2y agoI don't wear a mechanical watch anymore (I found the calorie-counting for smartwatches made losing weight a bit easier for me), but I've always loved clockwork solutions. Occasionally I'll fall into Wikipedia rabbit holes of pre-computer solutions to problems, usually involving lots of gears and springs and a lot of cleverness on the designers end. It fascinates me how much stuff has become trivial since the advent of the transistor.
- wis 2y agoIf you'd like to read a comprehensive blog post about the intricate mechanisms that make a mechanical watch work, with amazing interactive visualizations, I recommend reading this blog post[1] by Bartosz Ciechanowski, a person famous on HN for his high quality blog posts that explain things comprehensively, with nice visualizations. (the #1 top post on HN right now is his new blog post about the moon [2]). [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261533 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261533 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42443229 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42443229
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- aanet 2y agoThanks - this is amazing. A three year effort to make this.... shows dedication that few have. <3 <3
- dcminter 2y agoThis person's build is amazing! Mostly photos, but still super cool to see how "from scratch" it is - if you're expecting "bought a few components from Swiss companies" then, yeah, it's not that! I submitted this a week ago and sadly it sank without trace (poor choice of posting time I suspect), so I'm trying again. I have no affiliation with the builder.
- lostlogin 2y ago> Mostly photos Me and maybe a dozen others vastly prefer this. I almost never want video.
- BatFastard 2y agoYou and a few hundred thousand...
- dcminter 2y agoVideo never even occurred to me. I meant "not much text" !
- randomcarbloke 2y ago>The jewels, hairspring, mainspring, and the strap These are the things I expected him to have to source and I was correct, even Daniels bought springs.
- zvr 2y agoThank you for this, it's amazing!
- rrr_oh_man 2y ago> bought a few components from Swiss companies I know what you're referring to and it is exactly what I thought of immediately. Thanks for pointing out that this is not that!
- dcminter 2y agoI didn't have anyone specific in mind - but it seemed like a reasonable default assumption. In fact I think I landed on the post originally by thinking "I wonder how hard it would be to assemble a watch from parts?" and some cursory searching around that. I enjoy a channel called "wristwatch revival" that covers servicing and repair of watches of various types - that guy often sends off for parts so it was a natural thing to wonder I think.
- neom 2y agohttps://imgur.com/a/making-mechanical-watch-VmYL7qF https://imgur.com/a/making-mechanical-watch-VmYL7qF link direct to the gallery.
- dang 2y agoAh thanks - we've changed to that from https://old.reddit.com/r/watchmaking/comments/1gvdmyo/i_made_a_watch_from_scratch_link_to_the_build/ https://old.reddit.com/r/watchmaking/comments/1gvdmyo/i_made... above.
- dcminter 2y agoI did consider that when submitting, but the watchmaker submitted the post in reddit and had answered some questions there. Your call though. (I also enjoyed the overwhelmingly positive reception from the readers in that reddit sub - though that's less relevant of course)
- dang 2y agoAh good point. Let's change it back then!
- jasonjmcghee 2y agoIn case you haven't seen it before, my absolutely favorite watch resource: https://ciechanow.ski/mechanical-watch/ https://ciechanow.ski/mechanical-watch/
- aswinmohanme 2y agoThis blog started my love for mechanical watches. Love how intricate and cohesive the entire mechanism is.
- otherdave 2y agoOne of the reasons I love mechanical watches is that I've never tried to fully understand them, and the idea that there's a purely mechanical thing, that does something seemingly so simple yet magically and reliably, gives me a sense of wonder and appreciation for engineering and art. I'm really on the fence about whether or not I want to read this amazing looking article or just live on in ignorance :)
- RandallBrown 2y agoI think that link will only improve your appreciation for how magical a mechanical watch is. Especially when you consider people have been making them or a few hundred years.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- archermarks 2y agoI love this article so much. Demystified so much about how watches work.
- gxs 2y agoThis has got to be one of the best explanations of anything I've ever seen in any subject. Thank you for sharing - hope you have a great day.
- 2y ago
- eigenvalue 2y agoIf you liked this you might enjoy this series of video interviews with George Daniels, inventor of the coaxial escapement; he also made watches by hand: https://www.webofstories.com/play/george.daniels/1 https://www.webofstories.com/play/george.daniels/1
- elzbardico 2y agoThis is the kind of people we need to reboot our industrial civilization after the nuclear war. Send him to our New Zealand doomsday bunker.
- technothrasher 2y agoI can fully appreciate the amount of skill involved here. I'm currently on a journey to make a clock from scratch using traditional clockmaker's methods. I started from pretty much zero knowledge of even basic machining, let alone specific clock and watch work. I'm a couple years in now (working in my spare time between work and family obligations), and I can repair most types of issues with clocks and many watches. But I'm not quite tooled up and practiced in making the gears yet. That's the most major stumbling block currently to my ability to make a traditional clock completely from scratch.
- pavel_lishin 2y agoOne of my very vague goals is to build a clock, from scratch, without looking anything up. It wouldn't have to look like a wall clock; just something that keeps 24-hour time within reasonable tolerances. (It's been impossible to avoid knowledge of all clockmaking stuff, but I still avoid watching videos on how clocks are made. This is probably going to be something I do once the child is in college!)
- ramses0 2y agoIf you ever get to go to London... https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/clocks-timekeeping https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/clocks-timekeeping Latitude has a "natural" definition (sphere spins around, how big around are you spinning near the poles vs. the equator?). Longitude has no "natural" definition!? How far away are you from Mount Everest? ...only works when you have a natural sight line to the peak of the mountain... If "high noon" at London is exactly (ummm...) NOW! ...and you go 1000 miles west, how much TIME has passed between your "noon" and London's "noon"? You need a good watch... and how can you determine "high noon" on the pitching deck of a ship at sea? ...maybe not with your typical pendulum clock! It was such a mind-blowing experience to learn that maps (and thus CLOCKS!) were first a military and trade technology! If you have a good clock, you can get a good X-coord in addition to the "free" Y-coord. If you can get good X,Y then you can make a good map. If you have a good map, you can optimize your trade / military routes, etc, etc, etc. Highly worth going a bit out of the way for a visit, was actually one of the highlights of the trip for me.
- fancyfredbot 2y agoHe's going to feel real foolish when he finds out his phone had the time on it all along.
- NetOpWibby 2y agoYou don't seem fancy
- fancyfredbot 2y agoI'll admit I was aware that the motivation for this project was not likely to be timekeeping. I guess there's something about fancy watches which makes me want to poke fun at them. I'm not sure I'd have made fun of a clock. I certainly wouldn't make similar comments about Ben Eaters 8 bit breadboard computers for example - even though the same thing applies there to a possibly even greater extent. It's an anti-elitism thing I suppose. Anyway, the watch is actually very impressive and cool.
- lisper 2y agoPhoto log: https://imgur.com/a/making-mechanical-watch-VmYL7qF https://imgur.com/a/making-mechanical-watch-VmYL7qF This part blew my mind: "All the screws were hand made." This really is a watch made from scratch.
- userbinator 2y agoIn the world of industrial machinery it's not too surprising to have to make special fasteners from scratch, especially as replacement parts may no longer be available from the original manufacturer. Taps and dies are common tools, and single-point-threading on a lathe can also be used.
- michaelt 2y agoOn the other hand, the world of industrial machinery seldom needs M0.6 threads. Just trying to support it properly so it didn't bend away from your single-point thread cutter would be a challenge. And imagine how easy it would be to drop the part, and how hard it would be to dig it out of the coolant and swarf!
- putterson 2y agoI think the challenge with making such small screws would be mostly around - Making your own or acquiring cutting tools that fit in such spaces, e.g. able to thread up to a shoulder at that scale. - Measuring your progress. I'm really not sure how you'd measure pitch diameter for such a small screw without exotic measuring tools. Perhaps you would just cut it to fit the mating part, which on it's own would still be difficult to check due to the subtlety of the feel of such a small screw going in. - Cutting internal threads. I imagine making your own M0.6 tap would be quite tricky as you'd have to grind very small reliefs after making an M0.6 screw. Definitely not using coolant on parts this small; small amounts of lubricant if anything. Supporting the part shouldn't be much of a challenge as you would be taking requisitely small cuts with very small forces. I'm sure tweezers and loupes/microscopes are your friend when making watch parts.
- bangaloredud 2y ago[flagged]
- Brysonbw 2y agoInteresting