Horological Meandering

Big Time! Erwin Sattler - 1958-2008 Extremely large pendulum clocks fitted to tall clock towers are a true rarity. But an 8.80 meter high precision pendulum clock with constant force, temperature- and airpressurecompensation and which only deviates from p...  

I love the way The Big Clock has become the indisputable focal point of the Erwin Sattler factory building. It would be great to arrive at work every day and see this symbol of corporate pride displayed so prominently above the entrance. Wonderful post, t... 

I really thought it would be interesting for all the Purists comunity. Carlos Torres

The clock being the focal point of the building is so unique. Thank you for an excellent step by step write up of a historical occasion.The building is fabulous because of the clock! cheers fernando

Certainly quite different and I like it very much - thank you for the post! One question - curious what is being used for the various bearings in the clock? Cheers, Al

Many thanks for the report. Idle curiosity - what temperature range is it compensated for? I can image that if the "case" (building) itself isn't airconditioned you could get enormous temperature swings on a daily basis, and compensating for this is not e... 

I imagine that the pendulm has such as high thermal inertia due to its size that it's more or less immune to rapid swings in temperatue, so perhaps it's not a problem. nick

It is wonderful to see true precision craftsmanship still flourishing in this day and age of high tech materials and methods. Thanks for the brilliant post and excellent photos, I think this would be a fascinating stop off for any purist when visiting Mun... 

Hi Tim, (info taken from the Sattler web site) To determin the influence of temperature and pressure to different length of the pendulum, the size and shape of the pendulum weight and barometric compensation, it was necessarry to create an hermetic tank, ...  

Carlos, Thanks for the excellent report. E. Sattler must receive our PuristS Grand Prix positively the biggest timepiece featured on our forums! Although, I'm more in favoure of classic 36 - 38 mm diameter watches I'm sure this Big thing is just a fad. It... 

...  

Dear Carlos It was a pleasure to slowly work my way through the article and see the clock ‘appear’. At several points I could be heard to mutter “wow” out loud. The scale of this tower pendulum clock is staggering. I loved the shots of the ‘standard’ size... 

Sattler's clocks - very good modern day precision clocks that really last. Top quality. Very much like in Heinrich Sattler's day. Perhaps we should also remember how the early day precision clocks were made(1910) Karl Satori made a 3 month precision regul...  

Hi Carlos Using the Huygens system will reduce the inaccuracies of repeated winding. But what is the actual duration of 1 winding in this big clock. My small clock needs winding every 8 days Small Huygens Regulator Endless Chain winding Viennese Regulator...  

thx for sharing this great post

No message body This message has been edited by c.torres on 2008-09-13 12:30:08

Hi Torres Since you are on the subject of Erwin Sattler, you could perhaps tell us more about this range of watches. Thank you.