Brass Gears Clock LWP Free

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This is the free version of Brass Gears Clock LWP. If you enjoy this application, please consider buying the paid version. The paid version has many more display possibilities: Brass Gears Clock LWP Paid.

This live wallpaper simulates a pendulum clock. A pendulum clock keeps time using a weight (not shown), gears, and pendulum. The pendulum is 38 and 1/8 inches (994 mm) long from pivot to pendulum weight center. Any pendulum of this length, even one you make at home, will keep very good second by second time.

The clock is comprised of 13 separate "gears": 7 wheels, 4 sets of pins, and 2 pinions. The initial impetus driving the clock to motion is gravity acting on a weight, not shown, attached to a cord wrapped counter-clockwise around the shaft connecting the great wheel to the great wheel's pinion (just above the 6 o'clock position). The great wheel's pinion then imparts a clockwise force on the hour wheel, while the great wheel imparts a clockwise force on the minute wheel's pinion which is attached to and beneath the minute wheel. The minute wheel's teeth mesh with the pins on the third wheel driving the third wheel counter-clockwise. The third wheel's teeth mesh with the pins on the fourth wheel driving the fourth wheel clockwise. The fourth wheel's teeth mesh with the pins on the fifth wheel driving the fifth wheel counter-clockwise. The fifth wheel's teeth mesh with the pins on the escape wheel driving the escape wheel clockwise. The escape wheel is the end of the gear train.

The speed at which the escape wheel turns is limited by the two pallet faces of the pallets attached to the pendulum. The pallets alternately catch and release the escape wheel once per second. In this way, the pendulum regulates the speed of movement of all the gears of the clock. If all goes well, the escape wheel will turn 360 degrees once every minute, the minute wheel will turn 360 degrees once every hour, and the hour wheel will turn 360 degrees once every twelve hours.

The hour and minute hand are attached to the hour and minute wheel respectively. The clock dial features hour and minute markings so that an observer can tell the current hour of day from the hour hand, and the current minute of the hour from the minute hand.

Attributions:

This clock is inspired by Clayton Boyer's wooden clock designs, www.lisaboyer.com

The escapement (escape wheel and pallets) is of Clayton Boyers's design, used here with permission

All other "gears" (wheels, pinions, and pins) created using Matthias Wandel's Gear Template Generator, www.woodgears.ca/gear/index.html

Hour and minute markings are based on a free clock face at The Woodshop, www.thewoodshop.20m.com/clockfaces.htm (I have substituted my own roman numeral hours and chose to preserve IIII rather than IV for reasons of symmetry)

All images manipulated using the GNU Image Manipulation Program, www.gimp.org

All images further compressed in size using the *awesome* Tiny PNG service, www.tinypng.com

Clock display and logic written using the Moai cross-platform SDK, www.getmoai.com

SciLua Time library used for local time calculations, www.scilua.org/time.html