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A balance wheel, or balance, is the timekeeping device used in mechanical watches and small clocks, analogous to the pendulum in a pendulum clock.It is a weighted wheel that rotates back and forth, being returned toward its center position by a spiral torsion spring, known as the balance spring or hairspring.
Each swing of the balance wheel thus allows one tooth of the escape wheel to pass, advancing the wheel train of the clock by a fixed amount, moving the hands forward at a constant rate. The moment of inertia of the foliot or balance wheel controls the oscillation rate, determining the rate of the clock. The escape wheel tooth, pushing against ...
A poorly constructed or poorly maintained escapement will cause problems. The escapement must accurately convert the oscillations of the pendulum or balance wheel into rotation of the clock or watch gear train, and it must deliver enough energy to the pendulum or balance wheel to maintain its oscillation.
The existing clocks of the time, which used the verge escapement with a crude balance wheel, were very inaccurate. The pendulum, due to its isochronism, could be a much better timekeeper. His son Vincenzio began building a clock, but both he and Galileo died before it was completed.
The fourth wheel also turns the escape wheel pinion. Many clocks don't need this wheel because of their slower-moving escapements; in these the third wheel drives the escape wheel directly. Escape wheel which is released one tooth at a time by the escapement, with each swing of the pendulum or balance. The escape wheel keeps the pendulum or ...
Each beat gives the balance wheel an impulse, so there are two impulses per cycle. Despite being locked at rest most of the time, the escape wheel rotates typically at an average of 10 rpm or more. The origin of the "tick tock" sound is caused by this escapement mechanism. As the balance wheel rocks back and forth, the ticking sound is heard.
A turret clock or tower clock is a clock designed to be mounted high in the wall of a building, usually in a clock tower, in public buildings such as churches, university buildings, and town halls. As a public amenity to enable the community to tell the time, it has a large face visible from far away, and often a striking mechanism which rings ...
The pins and part of escape wheel are visible at bottom center. The GIF is slowed down to make the mechanism movement easier to see. A Roskopf , pin-lever , or pin-pallet escapement is an inexpensive, less accurate version of the lever escapement , used in mechanical alarm clocks , kitchen timers , mantel clocks and, until the 1970s, cheap ...