Making the first 10,000 year clock

The 10000 year clock

                                                       
A clock which can run for 10,000 years!! Is it possible to do so? Is it related to time travel or not? Lets see the answer!!!



The 10000 Year Clock is a monumental timepiece designed to tell time for ten millennia. Its first components are now being machined and tested. It's a special clock, designed to be a symbol, an icon for long-term thinking. It's of monumental scale inside a mountain in West Texas. The father of the Clock is Danny Hillis. He's been thinking about and working on the Clock since 1989. He wanted to build a Clock that ticks once a year, where the century hand advances once every 100 years, and the cuckoo comes out on the millennium. The vision was, and still is, to build a Clock that will keep time for the next 10,000 years.  As  humans are now technologically advanced enough so we can create not only extraordinary wonders but also civilization-scale problems. They are  likely to need more long-term thinking. 
                                                  
It was founded by two hikers cut through a stretch of cactus-filled desert outside what was once the small town of Van Horn, near the Mexican border, in West Texas. After walking for the better side of the day  in the scorching heat of the sun, they climbed up a craggy limestone ridge and finally arrived at an opening in the rock where the mouth of what appears to be a long, deep tunnel.As they headed up into the tunnel into the shadows not knowing where it lead to and  the sudden darkness and the drop in temperature startled their senses. After a few minutes they reached a cool chamber dimly lit from above. 

                                                          
The 10000 year clock tall column of strange shiny metal gears and rods rouse hundreds of meters above.  Steps were cut into the walls spiral upward, and the hikers walked until they reached a platform. A black globe suspended above depicts the night sky, encircled by metal disks that indicate the year and the century.A giant metal wheel sits in the middle of the platform, and the visitors each grasp a handle that juts out from its smooth edges. For the next several hours, they push and walk and push and walk in a circle, methodically, silently, until the wheel will turn no further. Exhausted, they rest on the platform and drift off to sleep. At noon the next day, they're suddenly awakened by the ethereal tones of chiming bells.Its some thing like science - fiction but is real clock which was made by Danny Hillis who started it in 1989.This clock would work for next 10 millenium and it is carved into the mountain with five room-sized anniversary chambers: 1 year, 10 year, 100 year, 1,000 year, and 10,000 year anniversaries. The one year anniversary chamber which is a special orrery. In addition to the planets and the Earth's moon, it includes all of the interplanetary probes launched during the 20th century, humankind's first century in space. Among others, you'll see the Grand Tour: Voyager 2's swing by of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. The Clock will activate and run the orrery once a year on a pre-determined date at solar noon.Power for the Clock comes from the two helical weight drives on either side of the Clock. The timing for the Clock is generated both by a torsional pendulum, with a one minute period, and by a Solar Synchronizer that re-calibrates the Clock to solar noon on any sunny day. To correct from solar time to the absolute time of the pendulum there is a special Equation of Time Cam. The display on the Clock is made of two elements; the Serial Bit Adders and the dials. The Adders convert the timing generated from the pendulum, using their binary mechanical system, to changes in the Clock's dials. The six dials represent the year, century, horizons, sun position, lunar phase, and the stars of the night sky.The chime system is generated by 20 Geneva drives with varying numbers of teeth. These drives convert the constant rotatory motion of the drive wheel into stepwise rotatory motion of a second wheel, providing intermittent turns. The bearing for these wheels are made of a special ceramic that doesn’t require lubrication. Together, these drives allow for the almost 3.65 million possible chimes needed to have a unique chime for each day within a 10 millennium span. The chimes are actually being written by musician Brian Eno, who has dubbed it “The Clock of the Long Now.”Finally, the clock face shows the sun and moon positions, a star field of the night sky, and a century ring and year ring to display the year in the “02011” format. Additionally, horizon lines  show what portion of the star field is actually visible at the moment. But the main clock face is not intended to show the actual time . Instead, visitors have to wind the clock face to show the present time. The point of this is to show how long it has been since the last person visited.

 The goal of the clock’s designers is to make something that helps orient everyone forward in time, something which is increasingly difficult in a short attention-span culture. There are few things that can help people see beyond the next vacation, next holiday or next Super Bowl. But the clock serves to inspire thinking on a much larger time frame. Questions should naturally arise, such as what will the world look like in 1,000 years? 10,000 years? What countries will even be around? What will cities be like and how will people live? When these types of questions begin to be asked, suddenly the actions of the person asking them becomes profoundly more important. In the midst of politics and debate about the environment, transportation, climate change, urban planning, taxes, and so on, it is easy to become complacent and end up focusing instead on the question, “How will all of this affect me?” This clock is aimed to turn our attention outward and ask, “How will all of this affect the people of the future?”

                                                          

After many years of work, the final design and engineering of the Clock is nearly complete, and fabrication of the full-size Clock parts has begun.So wait for the  10,000 year clock.


[via:ieee Spectrum]

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