Horology | brian r stuckey

Mar

Segmentus clock concept

Segmentus clock (concept)

By Art Lebedev – $n/a

http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/segmentus/

From the guy who brought us the Verbarius clock comes the Segmentus. (Is anyone else noticing a naming pattern here?) This concept clock was built to address the challenge of creating a digital clock with hands. While clocks have addressed this challenge before, this one brings the usual Art Lebedev polish to the final product. The only thing I want to know is how noisy would this be to operate? With dozens of little motors and mechanical parts, this might not be a clock that you would keep in your bedroom. Read more

Jun

Phosphor Watch E Ink Digital Calendar

E Ink Digital Hour Clock Watch with Black Leather Band

by Phosphor Watches $185.00 USD

http://www.phosphorwatches.com/

My primary interest is still, and always will be, collecting Nixie Clocks. However, I just found what is probably the first practical and mass produced e-ink watch. I’ve you’ve never seen an e-ink display, they are quite a bit different than the LCD monitor you’re using to read this. Instead of having the light be emitted from the display, light is reflected off of it like newspaper or any other printed medium. However, they have an amazing contrast ratio between black and white giving them a distinct advantage in legibility and making reading them on a sunny day easy. Read more

Apr

Matrix Cube Alarm Clock

By ThinGeek (OEM Unknown) $35

This is another gimmick clock but it is well executed and it looks nice. Each HH MM SS display is separated in to its own cube with the controls on the HH. They are teathered with a small wire and the whole device is powered via a mains transformer.

More…

Apr

Exposed Flip Clock

ThinkGeek (OEM Unknown) $50

ThinkGeek just recently released a clock that is a little unusual. Instead of focusing on weird LED displays or retro nixie tubes, they built a clock on a long-dead technology: flip clocks. I could try and explain them but I think Wikipedia does a better job. Read the description and see the videos after the jump.

Apr

Numimini – Video Demo

By Jon Ellis / ~$150

via eBay

Follow up to Numimini – Preview

I just made a quick video demo of the software included bu Jon to program the clock. Check it out.

http://www.ineedcaffeine.com/videos/numimini.flv

Apr

Dot-Matrix Desktop Clock

by DealExtreme (OEM Unkonow) $70 USD

I will be the first to admit that this clock is ugly. The only thing that saves this clock is the well executed LED display. It is unclear between the photos on DealExtreme.com whether this clock is orange or red, but I have seen videos and photos of both.

Mar

Samsung Approximation Clock

By John Smout / Clock-It / Price Unknown

I found this clock while searching for clocks to feature and reminds me a lot of the Verbarius clock. It is a large VFD display that spells out the time and appears to be able to display other information. Sadly, it seems that only four of these clocks were ever made. Go check out Clock-It now, he has some good stuff there.Samsung VFD display in grey metallic finish case Read more

Mar

Elektronika 7

A clock so unique it has its own Wikipedia entry

I found one of these clocks on eBay a while ago and shamelessly stole the images from it, from Wikipedia and from one other source (below.) They are old VFD Matrix displays that have become somewhat of a collector item. Since Wikipedia has a good description I will let them describe it:

Electronics 7 are industrial clocks with luminescent indicators where each figure was formed by four or eleven 7-segment lamps. For each indicator there was a board decoding the binary code sent by the main board. There were also models based on light-emitting diodes . The basic shortcoming of the clocks was that the segments of the display were gradually burnt out, and there was a significant difference in a luminescence between more often and less often displayed segments. It usually happened after ten or more years of continuous work. All the street and wall clocks were based on the kit by Saratov factory “Reflector” and even now are used in many administrative and industrial premises in Russia. The clocks were made on the basis of vacuum-fluorescent indicators manufactured in Russia.

Mar

Watches & Watchmaking

A collection of links on watchmaking and collecting that are a fun read:

Do you want me to add your site? Leave a message in the comments with the URL.

Mar

Super Electrofluorescent Profanity Machine

By Etsy user Koolatron / $125

I like this device. Not only is it a cool use of a great use of cyan VFD displays, but it is small and at $125, it is worth every cent.

First and foremost, it is a 4-letter-word device. Normally, these are made with tubes such as the B7971 or similar Panaplex displays (think of a flat version of a nixie tube). Instead, the inventor opted to go with a VFD. I’ve never seen a FLW this small and I’ve never seen one with display type. Basically, it is a device that spells out words, usually in English, that are exactly four letters long. Nice work! Second, this device acts as a clock. It might not be as polished as say, the Nocrotec, but this device does have a charm to it. I really hope the seller decides to make more of these. At $125, it is a great deal.