Comments on: Solar Synchronizer

By: Duane Watson

Duane Watson — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 00:47:53 +0000

I wish you had started a hundred years ago. I would love to visit the final installation. I guess the journey is the real point.

By: Angus M

Angus M — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 23:29:48 +0000

Look through any window from say, the Georgian era, you will find the view is distorted as a result of the tiny summer melt within the glass produced every year.

By: John Edds

John Edds — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 02:58:16 +0000

Scott M., that’s actually an oft repeated myth. Glass does not flow over time. If it did, the optics in telescopes and reading glasses that are centuries old would be off–they are not. Glass-wares created in ancient times would have slumped into puddles–they have not. Obsidian (natural glass) arrow and spear points wouldn’t remain recognizable, let alone retain their sub-micrometer edges.

By: Scott M

Scott M — Thu, 21 May 2009 02:26:18 +0000

I can’t think of many glass-like materials that won’t flow and deform over time; I don’t think that lens is going to stay accurate for too many centuries, if, as it appears, it’s only supported at the edges.

And if the idea is to build the clock out of materials that don’t tempt thieves… that lens looks like a pretty tempting target. Would you be better off with a mirror hollowed out of a block of metal too bulky to easily walk off with?

By: Wm Jon Ackley

Wm Jon Ackley — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 03:43:45 +0000

Such things as this beatiful notion of allowing engineering to mate with high art, helps us understand, and reach out to touch the Cosmos that The Universal Architect set in motion. Bravo…… This when complete will be the eighth wonder of the world, in half a million years it is something I would feel proud to have found by an alien xenoarchiologist…..

By: Scott Boek

Scott Boek — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 21:56:54 +0000

YAAAWWWWWNNNNN…………………………

Yet another FANTASTIC waste of funds.
Clap-clap!

After all …isn’t the world “as we know it” ending in ‘2012′. Think my SWATCH will do just FINE ;)

By: Alexander Rose

Alexander Rose — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 03:22:01 +0000

“Tom Burnham was all:

Use of “shape memory alloy” appears to be yet another violation of your supposed guiding principle of maintainability by bronze-age technology.”

Yes this is the part I like the least about this solution. We can store a lot of the material with the clock as one solution. Or can use a large lever made from two materials that expand at different rates, but there are few materials that expand a lot with temperature and are long lasting. And even so it makes it less accurate than the SMA solution.

By: Alexander Rose

Alexander Rose — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 03:18:55 +0000

“Tom Burnham was all:

What about the changing number of days per year??? Chapront (1997) gives a formula which implies that days will be almost a minute longer in Y12K than they are today and that the cumulated difference will be about three days. The latter would presumably appear as errors in your astronomical outputs.”

The only part of the Clock that cares about absolute noon is the pendulum that is corrected through the Equation of Time cam by the solar trigger. That cam is 3 dimensionally curved to compensate for the slowing of the earths rotation, plus the precessional cycle.

By: Tom Burnham

Tom Burnham — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:25:38 +0000

Use of “shape memory alloy” appears to be yet another violation of your supposed guiding principle of maintainability by bronze-age technology.

By: Tom Burnham

Tom Burnham — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:02:01 +0000

By: عکس بازیگران

عکس بازیگران — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 05:51:34 +0000

thank you (usefull)

By: Long Views » Blog Archive » Intrinsic metal coloration

Long Views » Blog Archive » Intrinsic metal coloration — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 01:31:28 +0000

[...] Through a fairly low power laser process some clever folks over at the University of Rochester have come up with a way to generate an intrinsic colored surface on metals. They can even get an extremely pure black. Why is this cool? For the Clock of the Long Now project we are always on the lookout for ways of coloring metal for parts of the clock in ways that wont fail over time. A process like this could be used on the dials, or even on metals that we need to absorb sunlight to give us temperature variation. [...]

By: Joey

Joey — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 20:05:16 +0000

How about a coating of a material which has some kind of lotus effect? Like that, rain can wash the lense clear again after it has been soiled with mud… rain at least is supposed to fall every once in a while, isn’t it?

By: Mark

Mark — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 19:38:43 +0000

Demetirus Nelon’s point brings to mind the new (and not yet well-established) technology of a transparent coating of titanium dioxide on the outer surface to catalytically oxidize at least the organic contaminents.

By: Demitrius Nelon

Demitrius Nelon — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:10:23 +0000

Interesting design. I’m curious about how clean/clear the outer lens needs to be in order for this to work. In the event of massive amounts of debris in the atmosphere, what is the likelihood that something like this would function after some of it settled directly on this device?