CH708648B1 - Watch with astronomical indication. - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to a watch comprising at least one astronomical indication, said watch comprising means for displaying (21, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31) the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian and / or daily solar declination (18, 19, 20, 21). The watch may also include display means for months, solstices and equinoxes (12, 13, 14, 15, 16) and local latitude (32, 33, 34, 35).

Description

Description: [0001] The invention relates to a watch comprising at least one astronomical indication.

By watch is meant a timepiece of sufficiently small size to be worn on the body as opposed to large timepieces such as astronomical clocks.

[0003] Timepieces are known that include an astronomical representation mechanism, for example Giovanni Dondi's astrarium. Other astronomical clocks exist such as the Astronomical Clock of the Strasbourg Cathedral or that of the Clock Tower in Bern. However, these clocks were made for local geographical conditions.

[0004] Patent CH 688 171 describes an additional astronomical representation mechanism for a timepiece comprising a first device intended to provide a representation of the appearance of the moon as a function of time at a predetermined geographical location, combined with a second device intended to produce a visualization of the movement of the moon's convolution and a representation of the celestial vault animated by a rotational movement.

Patent CH 658 763 describes a mechanism providing a representation of the starry sky and to inform on the position of the main bodies and on certain astronomical phenomena.

Patent CH 690 516 describes a watch offering a representation of the race of the sun which allows to know the hours of sunrise and sunset. This mechanism, however, gives no indication of the effects of the daily solar declination and does not indicate the height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian.

[0007] Patent CH 673 747 A describes a watch offering an indication of the daily solar variation. The indication of the daily solar declination is not explicit of these effects and the understanding of the physical phenomenon. This mechanism does not give the height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian.

[0008] Thus, the clocks and watches that comprise an astronomical representation mechanism described in the state of the art ignore the elements that govern the seasons and in particular the height of the sun. In addition, these mechanisms provide indications concerning the stars that depend on the location of the observation and it is not possible to modify them. These timepieces are therefore intended for reading information in a specific place and are erroneous in the rest of the world. This implies knowing the situation of the wearer and building a movement specifically for this place.

The object of the present invention is to overcome the aforementioned drawbacks. The object of the invention is to create a watch that informs its wearer about at least one astronomical information relating to the sun. More precisely, the astronomical information relating to the sun relates to the solar declination or the height of the sun at the passage of the meridian.

This object of the invention is achieved by providing a watch comprising an astronomical indication, said watch further comprising determining means controlling means for displaying the solar declination and / or the height reached by the sun when of the passage to the meridian.

Another object of an embodiment of the invention is to provide a watch indicating solstices and equinoxes.

Another object of the invention is to ensure that the indication of the solar declination, the indication of solstices, equinoxes and the maximum height of the sun for a given day are automatically reset to the angular position. exact after an indefinite stop of the movement by simply setting the time of it.

Another object of the invention is to provide a watch that adjusts the latitude of the place.

These objects are achieved by providing a watch of the defined type of input, said watch comprising determining means controlling means for displaying the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian and / or declination daily solar as well as latitude.

Said means for displaying the daily solar variation may consist of a first analog display comprising a disk comprising a representation of the earth oscillating at an angle representing the daily solar declination on a graduated scale.

The means for displaying the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian may consist of a second analog display comprising a needle or a disc indicating said height on a graduated scale.

The watch may include means for adjusting and displaying the latitude.

The watch includes an indicator showing the months, the equinoxes and the solstices.

The watch may comprise an astronomical mechanism, said astronomical mechanism comprising a mechanism for indicating the daily solar variation animating said display means of the daily solar declination.

Said astronomical mechanism may comprise means for adjusting the latitude and a mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian animating said display means of the daily height reached by the sun during the passage to the meridian.

Said indication mechanism of the daily solar declination may comprise a declination cam and first connecting means kinematically linking the declination cam to said display means of the daily solar declination.

Said cam may be shaped in such a way that the daily variation d indicated by said means of displaying the daily solar variation for a day j is given by the equation d = arcsin (0.3978 x sin ( 280 + 1.914 x sin (357 + 0.9856 xj) + 0.02 x sin (2 * (357 + 0.9856 xj)) + 0.9856 x (d)).

The astronomical mechanism may comprise a second declination cam performing a rotation on itself at the same frequency as the first declination cam by a probe cooperating with said second cam under the action of a return spring, said feeler setting in motion a gear train whose movement reproduces the evolution of solar declination, said gear train reproducing the variation in height in the sky of the sun.

The probe, the second cam and the return spring may be separate parts or be joined in one piece.

The second declination cam, the feeler, the second cam and the return spring may be dependent on a movable platen which can turn on itself a given value and rotate the same value as the platen.

The plate can rotate on itself via the action of a corrector actuated by the wearer of the watch, this action to display on the dial the modification of the latitude of the place and change the position of the display of the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian and returns to its original position after one year.

The invention will be better understood by those skilled in the art through the following description of an embodiment in connection with the accompanying drawings in which: FIG. 1 is a top view of a watch according to the invention, FIG. 2 is a top view of the watch without the main dial and the indicator discs.

In the following description, we will not describe the watch movement in its entirety, but only the functional parts of a mechanism allowing the indication of the daily solar declination, the indication of solstices and equinoxes, indication of the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian and the setting and display of the latitude. In a traditional way, this watch movement may include a perpetual calendar mechanism, but may also include an indication of the date with manual correction or no date indication. The invention uses a watch movement that can be any conventional mechanical movement with automatic or manual winding or electronic quartz type. This watch movement provides the time reference to the watch according to the invention.

The watch according to the invention illustrated in FIG. 1 consists of a watch case 1, a bezel 2 with a winding member and / or time setting 3 and a bracelet 4. The current time is indicated by the hour hand 5 and the minute hand 6. The dial 7 has indexes 8 and a timer 9.

The watch illustrated in FIG. 1 has five analog displays.

The first analog display, located at 12 o'clock, indicates the date of the month in a window (10) using 2 disks 10a and 10b.

The second analog display, located at 3 o'clock, consists of a disc 12 and a graduated scale 11 months, indications 13 and 15 equinoxes as well as indications 14, and 16 solstices. Disk 12 goes around in one year.

The third analog display, located at 9 o'clock, makes it possible to indicate the value of the daily solar declination by means of a disc 17 on the graduated scale 20 and 20a. The scale is graduated from -23.44 ° for the winter solstice to + 23.44 ° for the summer solstice. On disk 17 is represented the equator and a meridian as well as an orthogonal view of the earth. The declination of a celestial body is the angle that the direction of the celestial body makes with the celestial equatorial plane (parallel to the terrestrial equatorial plane). In the case of stars this angle varies little; on the other hand, the declination of the Sun varies from day to day except in the vicinity of the solstices. The tropics of Cancer and Capricorn as well as the Arctic polar circles 18a provide a better understanding of the action of the inclination of the earth's axis.

The fourth analog display, located at 5 o'clock, indicates for a given day, the maximum height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian. This indication includes 2 concentric discs operated separately by the mechanism. The upper disc 31 is driven by the mechanism of modification of the latitude, it comprises the mark 27 for the indication of the winter solstice, the mark 28 for the indication of the equinoxes and the mark 29 for the indication of the solstice of the 'summer. The upper disc 31 comprises an opening 31a which makes it possible to see the support of the needle 30 in the form of a sun 21. The indication of the height of the sun when the meridian passes is carried out with the sun-shaped needle 21 and the scale 26, height depends on the day of the year and the latitude.

At 7 o'clock is the fifth analog display whose function is to indicate the latitude of the place on a scale 33 graduated 0 ° for the equator at 60 ° north latitude and 40 ° south latitude at The latitude of the place can be adjusted by the user as will be explained in the following description.

For the sake of clarity, the description of the astronomical mechanism, of which all the components are represented fig. 2, will be done in the following order: we will first describe the mechanism of indication of the daily solar declination which animates the second and the third analog display then the mechanism of indication of the daily height reached by the sun during the meridian passage that animates the fourth analog display followed by the mechanism to change the latitude and visible on the fifth display.

FIG. 2 shows the mechanism for indicating the daily solar declination and part of the mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian.

On the plate 40 are fixed all the components of this mechanism, the power take-off is constituted, for this embodiment, by a pinion 41 driven by the watch movement of the watch. The pinion 41 is integral with the pinion 42 which drives the pinion 43 which drives the mobile 44 by activating the gear 45 comprising 31 teeth. The gear 45 is driven in the usual way by a thirty-first complete revolution per day and is held in position by the jumper 47. On the mobile 44, two gears are driven which each work with the stars 48 and 49 which control the disks 10a and 10b of the indication of the calendar of the month. The jumpers 50 and 51 hold them in position.

Through a kinematic chain comprising the wheels 44, 52, 53, the gear 54 of 80 teeth will take a turn on itself in one year. The gear 54 comprises 2 jumpers 55 which make it possible to drive the concentric axis 56 by collaborating with a star 12 secured to the axis. On the axis 56 are also secured a wheel 57 and the cam 58. On the axis 56 is fixed the disk 12 which indicates the days, the months, the seasons the solstices and the equinoxes and will take a turn on itself in one year. The corrector 59 which drives the finger 60 collaborates with the wheel 57 and makes it possible to shift 1/12 all the members secured to the axis relative to the gear 54 and performs a correction of 1 month per pulse.

The following description relates to the part of the mechanism that controls the third display for representing the action of the modification of the daily solar declination.

The wheel 64 is in contact with the cam 54 via the lever 64a and drives the wheel 65 which is secured to the disc 17 which indicates the variation of the daily solar declination on the scale 20 visible on the dial . The tooth ratio between the wheel 65 and the toothed portion of the lever 64 is M>, in order to restrict the range of motion of the lever. This also makes it possible to produce a cam whose size is compatible with a construction to be contained in a watch.

The disc 17 oscillates from -23.44 ° to + 23.44 ° reproducing faithfully the evolution of the solar declination. The cam 54 is shaped such that for a given day j, j representing the rank of the day in the year, the declination d indicated by the orientation of the disc 18 solves the equation: d = arcsin (0.3978 x sin (280 + 1.914 x sin (357 + 0.9856 xj) + 0.02 x sin (2 * (357 + 0.9856 xj)) + 0.9856 xj)) Equator 18 on the disk 17 indicates 0 ° at spring and autumn equinoxes, -23.44 ° at summer solstice and + 23.44 ° at winter solstice with recall due to meridian and graduation 20a.

The description below relates to the part of the mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian. As previously described this mechanism allows to animate the fourth analog display indicating the height of the sun.

The wheel 57 which rotates per year drives the wheel 40 teeth 66 which drives the wheel constituted by 20 teeth 67 and sets in motion the ring of 80 teeth 68 which performs 2 turns per year. The ring 69 contains an internal toothing of sixty teeth 70 which is the ring gear of an epicyclic gear train. The ring 70 transmits the torque to the sun gear of thirty teeth 74 via the satellite of fifteen teeth 73 which is integral with the planet carrier 71. Thus the sun gear 74 makes one turn per year.

The sun gear 74 drives the wheel of thirty teeth 75 whose pivot point rests on the plate 72. On the same axis as the wheel 75, there is a second cam 76 which reproduces the evolution of the solar declination and which drives a partially toothed part 77 by means of the feeler 77a, the part 77 is concentric with the wheel 68 and it is conjugated with a wheel sector 78 integral with the part 79 on which the sector 30 bearing the visible sun 21 rests on the dial. The cam 76 controls the movement of the sun 21 and reproduces the maximum height of the sun for each day of the year.

The plate 72 is an important part of the device, it is concentric with the wheel 68, supports the cam 76 and has 2 toothed sectors 70a and 70b. The sector 72a drives the sector 31 visible on the dial, sector which contains a cut 31a to see the sector 30 which carries the sun 21.

The description below relates to the part of the mechanism comprising the means for adjusting the latitude, visible latitude on the fifth display. The modification of the latitude also concerns the fourth display because the mechanisms are linked.

To change the latitude, the wearer of the watch will actuate pushers that will act on the correctors 82 and 86. The corrector 82 will correct the latitude to the south and the corrector 86 to the north. The fingers 83 and 87 will actuate the stars of 24 teeth 88 and 89. Thus each pulse will rotate 15 ° the pinion 90 which actuates the wheel 91 which itself drives the wheel sector 92. The ratio between the pinion 90 and the Wheel sector 92 is 3 so that the latter realizes an angle of 5 ° at each correction. On the same axis as the wheel sector 92 is driven the wheel 93 of 72 tooth and the pinion 94 of 20 teeth. The wheel 93 is held in position by the jumper 95 and retains the displacement of 5 ° in the absence of correction. The modification of the latitude is done in steps of 5 ° and the indication on the dial also advances in steps of 5 ° because the disc 35 is driven by the wheel 94. The wheel 93 drives the plate 72 via the toothed sector 72b while the pinion 94 drives the planet carrier 71 of the epicyclic gear train through the toothed sector 71a.

The plate 72 then pivots on itself by driving in its rotational movement the wheel 75 and the cam 76 which changes the height of the visible sun on the dial while the satellite holder 71 pivots on itself causing the satellite 73. The toothed sector 72a of the plate 72 drives the wheel sector 96 coupled to the axis 97 on which is fixed the disk 31 indicating the remarkable points of the race of the sun namely the solstices and equinoxes.

The modification of the latitude actuates the two discs 30 and 31 through the satellite door 71 and the plate 72 and keeps the relative orientation of the cams 58 and 76, the respective feelers are in contact with the points corresponding to the same dates on each of the cams.

A change in the value of the latitude has the effect of pivoting the plate 72, however the cam 76 must keep the same relative orientation with respect to the cam 58 which corresponds to a given day. It is therefore necessary to correct the action of the rotation of the wheel 73 which pivots around the wheel 72. This correction is made by moving the satellite door 71 by an angular value allowing the wheel 73 to rotate of the same value but reverse. Thus, the relative orientation of the cam 76 with respect to the cam 58 will remain the same and the respective probes will be in contact with the same position on each of the cams.

If the change of latitude is 60 °, the plate 72 rotates 30 °, the wheel 75 rotates on itself 60 °, it is necessary that the satellite door rotates 20 ° so that the wheel 74 turns 60 ° counterclockwise to compensate for the offset.

The size ratio and the size of the various organs are chosen to obtain the most favorable system, the most efficient, the easiest to produce and operate.

Those skilled in the art will understand that both the analog displays and the display device of the solar disk can be replaced by digital or digital displays, particularly in the case of quartz watches. In the latter case, the mechanisms of the type of the one described above, which is particularly suitable for a mechanical watch, can be replaced by an electronic chip determining the value of the declination, for example by an algorithm, as well as the height of the sun at the zenith from the coordinates of the place where the wearer is.

Claims (13)

claims 1. Watch comprising at least one astronomical indication characterized in that said watch comprises determining means controlling means for displaying the daily solar variation (17,18) and / or the daily height (21,26) attained by the sun when crossing the meridian. 2. Watch according to claim 1, characterized in that said means for displaying the daily solar declination consist of a first analog display comprising a disc (17) with mark (18) indicating the daily solar declination on a graduated scale (20). ). 3. Watch according to claim 1, characterized in that the means for displaying the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian consist of a second analog display comprising a needle (21) indicating said height on a graduated scale ( 26). 4. Watch according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that it comprises means for adjusting and displaying the latitude (32, 33, 34, 35) and / or adjustment and display means ( 15, 16, 17) of the date (10) and the month (12, 13). 5. Watch according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that said determining means comprise an astronomical mechanism comprising a daily sun declination indicating mechanism animating said display means of the daily solar declination. 6. Watch according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that said determining means comprise an astronomical mechanism comprising a mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian animating said display means of the daily height reached by the sun when crossing the meridian. 7. Watch according to claim 5, characterized in that said astronomical mechanism comprises means for adjusting the date and the indication mechanism of the daily solar declination animating said display means of the daily solar declination. 8. Watch according to claim 6, characterized in that said astronomical mechanism comprises means for adjusting the date and the mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian animating said display means of the daily height reached by the sun when crossing the meridian. 9. Watch according to claim 6, characterized in that said astronomical mechanism comprises means for adjusting the latitude and the mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian animating said display means of the daily height reached by the sun when crossing the meridian. 10. Watch according to claim 5, characterized in that said mechanism for indicating the daily solar declination comprises a first declination cam (58) and connecting means (64, 65) kinematically linking said first declination cam (58). ) said display means of the daily solar declination. 11. Watch according to claim 6, characterized in that said mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian comprises a first declination cam (58) and first connecting means (57, 66, 67, 68) which drives an epicyclic gear train (69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74) and second linkage means (75) kinematically linking a second declination cam (76) as well as third linkage means (77). , 78, 79) to said means for displaying the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian. 12. Watch according to claims 9 and 11, characterized in that said mechanism for indicating the daily height reached by the sun during the transition to the meridian comprises means for adjusting the latitude (82, 83, 86, 87) and fourth connecting means (90, 91, 92, 93, 94) which drives the epicyclic gear (69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74) as well as the second connecting means (75) and the second cam (76). ) to maintain the position of a finger (77a) on the second cam (76) at the point corresponds to the same day of the annual cycle of solar declination as the finger (64a) on the first cam (58) during a change of latitude and second and third connecting means (75, 76, 77, 78, 79) cinematically connecting the means for adjusting the latitude (82, 86) to said means for displaying the daily height reached by the sun during the meridian crossing for a given latitude. 13. Watch according to one of claims 10 and 11, characterized in that said cams (58, 76) are shaped so that the daily declination d indicated by said display means of the daily solar declination for a day j is given by the equation d = arcsin (0.3978 x sin (280 + 1.914 x sin (357 + 0.9856 xj) + 0.02 x sin (2 * (357 + 0.9856 xj)) + 0.9856 xj)).