[LEAPSECS] Adjusting Big Ben video (was Re: Of stepping motors and leap seconds)

[Richard Langley]

And while we are on the topic of the history of Big Ben:

A prototype of the Great Clock at Westminster (usually referred to as Big Ben, although that was the name given to the great bell that chimes the hours) was installed in Christ Church Cathedral, here in Fredericton, in 1854, by the firm of Denison. Big Ben began operation on 31 May, 1859. By the way, if you're interested in the history of Big Ben, you might try to track down the slim 1946 book "The Book of Big Ben: The Story of the Great Clock of Westminster" by Alfred Gillgrass (Citizen and Liveryman, The Worshipful Company of Clockmakers, London) and with a foreward by Lt.-Cmdr. Rupert T. Gould (who restored the
marine chronometers of John Harrison).

-- Richard Langley

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| Richard B. Langley                            E-mail: lang at unb.ca         |
| Geodetic Research Laboratory                  Web: http://gge.unb.ca/     |
| Dept. of Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering    Phone:    +1 506 453-5142   |
| University of New Brunswick                   Fax:      +1 506 453-4943   |
| Fredericton, N.B., Canada  E3B 5A3                                        |
|        Fredericton?  Where's that?  See: http://www.fredericton.ca/       |
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> On Feb 11, 2019, at 11:44 AM, Tony Finch <dot at dotat.at> wrote:
> 
> Warner Losh <imp at bsdimp.com> wrote:
> 
>> How do they keep big Ben in sync these days? Eg, who decides it is running
>> fast or slow?
> 
> I don't know about how they do it, but Frank King has written about how he
> keeps the University clock in Cambridge reasonably in sync:
> 
> http://www.scy.org.uk/chimes.htm
> 
> The Big Ben chimes were copied from Cambridge. There's another clock in
> Trinity College which has a similar mechanism to the Big Ben clock, and a
> much more sophisticated monitoring system than the University clock -
> 
> http://trin-hosts.trin.cam.ac.uk/clock/main.php
> 
> The second page of this has pictures of the ajustment weights and how they
> are placed on the pendulum.
> 
> http://trin-hosts.trin.cam.ac.uk/clock/img/TCSS_Newton_2010.pdf
> 
> The setups for adding coins to the pendulums of Big Ben and the University
> clock are not quite as beautifully engineered as this!
> 
> Tony.
> -- 
> f.anthony.n.finch  <dot at dotat.at>  http://dotat.at/
> Fair Isle: Northwest 4 or 5 becoming variable 3, then south or southwest 6 to
> gale 8. Moderate or rough, becoming very rough later in west. Wintry showers
> then rain. Good, occasionally poor.
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