To see this working, head to your live site.

Getting a grip

I am finding the components that require an interference fit of the shaft, keep slipping. I am using 1.5mm St St And drilled the hole a tight 1.4mm. I would like to see components that need to grip the shaft, have an integral boss to take a m3 grub screw. Or could you provide me the necessary files, to allow me to add it.

I am going to add to my clock some small magnets and hall sensors to provide feedback, to synchronise and lock to RTC.

I would like to have a twin stepper clock one for seconds and another for the minute train. That would enable self setting, from various time standards.

Thanks for some very interesting time projects.

3 comments

3 Comments

testassured

May 17

Hi Steve

I am building the Desk Clock SP6. With the CNC board. In the UK I can't find music wire, the stainless I have rolls true. For my fanciful ideas of a self correcting version I would use a ESP32 with wifi.

Steve

May 17

Replying to

The loads on the desk clocks are very light, so whatever you have should be fine.

btw, music wire is a common name in the US. It might also be called piano wire, spring steel, spring wire, or high tensile wire.

Steve

May 16

You didn't mention which clock you are building. The newer Crazy Gear Desk Clocks have set screws built in. They are much more reliable than press fit components. You can glue the shafts into position using epoxy if needed for gear 2 and gear 5 if needed.

I tried stainless steel arbors with random success. It seems to have a lot of variation. Sometimes it is annealed and bends way too easily. Other times it is half hard. Music wire is much more predictable since it always comes fully hardened.

Adding sensors to synchronize the time is a great idea. Of course, it also comes with additional complexity. Please post pictures if you design anything.

The existing stepper motor controller is incredibly accurate, but the clock will lose time if power goes out. I have thought about an algorithm that keeps track of elapsed time using the on-board flash memory. If power goes out, it would re-synchronize and detect how many seconds were lost. No sensors would be needed, but the time could be off by up to 6 hours upon power-up. It might take 10 minutes or more to synchronize. Your idea would be much quicker to calibrate.

Steve