Delicacy of Pocket Chronometers?

[Incroyable]

Are the perceptions that spring detent pocket chronometers being very delicate perhaps a product of its time?

That is to say during the pocket chronometer's heyday transport was all done by horse and carriage. These forms of transport can be quite rough and naturally would cause unexpected jolts as well as someone riding roughshod on a horse.

By the time of the motorcar pocket watches were just beginning to go out of fashion and certainly the days of the pocket chronometer were long over by then.

 

[Bernhard J.]

One will easily manage to stop a pocket chronometer by gentle rotational moves around the dial axis and in the right "phase". With a lever watch this is not possible, if the escapement works properly. This still is true today.

 

[Incroyable]

One will easily manage to stop a pocket chronometer by gentle rotational moves around the dial axis and in the right "phase". With a lever watch this is not possible, if the escapement works properly. This still is true today.

I have to wonder how people managed to travel around with pocket chronometers in those days.

Hans Staeger's Arnold book quotes a satisfied client of Arnold who claims he traveled all around England with his trusty and reliable Arnold pocket chronometer.

 

[Audemars]

I think this is very probably apocryphal, but my grandfather told me that the original Louis-Benjamin Audemars once tried to make an "automatic" movement, but it only worked if you were riding a horse...................
Paul

 

[Audemars]

On reflection, would "Hunters" have been so called if they broke down with a lot of jolting?
P

 

[Bernhard J.]

I have to wonder how people managed to travel around with pocket chronometers in those days.

These probably were a lucky few who were able to afford a chronometer. They were perhaps carried by servants in a palanquin when traveling? And from the psychological point of view, if one spends enormeous amounts for a watch, then IT IS good, otherwise you would be a stupid buyer and who wants to admit that .

Seriously, if a pocket chronometer stops maybe once in a month (if at all) due to an unfortunate impulse, the most people will not have minded, since all the other time it worked with really precise rates. Cheap(er) watches will have stopped more often for various reasons not being related to the principle of the escapement (or have had bad rates).

 

[John Matthews]

Seriously, if a pocket chronometer stops maybe once in a month (if at all) due to an unfortunate impulse, the most people will not have minded, since all the other time it worked with really precise rates. Cheap(er) watches will have stopped more often for various reasons not being related to the principle of the escapement (or have had bad rates).

Bernard - I think in the second half of the C19th, when pocket chronometers were not uncommon, I think well made watches without detent escapement were reliable and didn't have 'bad rates'.

In my view when purchased by the 'general' public it was a case of I want it because I can afford it, irrespective of all other factors.

John

 

[Incroyable]

The Belvilles were well known for using an 18th century Arnold pocket chronometer all the way up until WWII when walking around London selling Greenwich Mean Time.

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Ruth-Belville-The-Greenwich-Time-Lady

 

[Bernhard J.]

Hi John,

I had rather thought of the first half of the 19th century, when verge watches were still made and sold in large quantities.

You are imo absolutely right, a well made and high grade lever watch of the second half C19th with compensation balance was in practical daily use just as good (in terms of rates) as any contemporary detent chronometer. And perhaps a little bit more reliable, because of the self-starting lever escapement.

Cheers, Bernhard

 

[Incroyable]

I wonder if by the late Victorian period pocket chronometers were mostly sold to horological enthusiasts such as how one today might order a new perpetual calendar or tourbillon wristwatch from Patek, etc.

 

[Bernhard J.]

I would rather compare it with purchasing a Rolex Daytona instead of a Zenith El Primero.

 

[Incroyable]

It's interesting because you couldn't even show off these expensive watches since they were all hidden inside vest pockets.

 

[gmorse]

Hi Jeffrey,

The Belvilles were well known for using an 18th century Arnold pocket chronometer all the way up until WWII when walking around London selling Greenwich Mean Time.

Looking at her picture, I don't think Ruth Belville would have been in the habit of walking anywhere at a fast pace, let alone running, it would not have been seemly, and I'm certain that the same applied to her mother, Maria.

Regards,

Graham

 

[Incroyable]

Hi Jeffrey,


Looking at her picture, I don't think Ruth Belville would have been in the habit of walking anywhere at a fast pace, let alone running, it would not have been seemly, and I'm certain that the same applied to her mother, Maria.

Regards,

Graham

Indeed she found the name Tim vulgar.

 

[Dr. Jon]

My experience carrying detent pocket chronometers has been that they run well. I did not run jog or play contact sports with them in my pocket. I believe that they could be carried in a well sprung carriage or on the back of horse in any smooth gait. They require care but are still portable.

Perhaps they can be stopped buy a well timed twist but this is unusual in pocket carry.

Detent Pocket chronometers went to sea to navigate sailing ships. Bligh's second voyage used a pocket chronometer by Earnshaw which performed very successfully.

I doubt detent chronometers would keep good time in a vessel in severe storm, especially a steam powered one.

Marine, box chronometers also have limits. Lewis and Clark carried on one their expedition and got no useful data using it.

The development of torpedo boat destroyers led to torpedo boat watches which were for rigors the detent escapement could not tolerate.

 

[John Matthews]

Marine, box chronometers also have limits. Lewis and Clark carried on one their expedition and got no useful data using it.

Jon

Given the mode of the transport used by Lewis and Clarke - surely this is hardly surprising. Do you have a reference?

John

 

[Dr. Jon]

My reference is Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose. The book describes how Lewis and Clark first took possession of a box chronometer, went to an observatory to determine its rates and then carried it with them with the plan to determine longitude as they explored the then new Louisiana Purchase.

I believe they carried it in a padded box, but it has been along time since i read the book, so I may have this wrong.

Their records indicate the chronometer had some rough episodes and for all their effort they got no useful sightings from it. The narrative is not even clear as to whether they still had it when they finished their trip.

 

[Incroyable]

I believe surveyors also used to use box chronometers.

Some of the larger 19th century projects involved the transport of numerous box chronometers over unpopulated rough terrain.

 

[Dr. Jon]

While looking into the reference for the Lewis and Clark chronometer I checked into the Mason Dixon survey. For those outside the US, the Mason Dixon line is most of the border between Maryland and Pennsylvania and was also regarded, incorrectly as the Northern border of the US "Old South". There is a famous bourbon whiskey that advertised that they did nto sell it North of the MAson Dixon Line

I found that they did not use a chronometer but instead set up pendulum clocks at various places along the way to get time, and thus Longitude.

I beleive some chronometers were set up for survey, but these are unusual.

I found a reference to the Hutton Patent Lever watch that the Bond Company sold to the US Army with an indication that it was to be used in a survey of the Gadsden Purchase. This is a small parcel of land the US bought from Mexico to clean up the border with the land the US took by force in the Mexican War.

It seems that detent chronometers were considered too delicate for surveys in the wilderness.

 

[Jerry Treiman]

The 1869 Powell Survey of the Colorado River, using four dories, reportedly had four chronometers with them. I have not found any additional details

 

[Leigh Callaway]

My reference is Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose. The book describes how Lewis and Clark first took possession of a box chronometer, went to an observatory to determine its rates and then carried it with them with the plan to determine longitude as they explored the then new Louisiana Purchase.
I believe they carried it in a padded box, but it has been along time since i read the book, so I may have this wrong.
Their records indicate the chronometer had some rough episodes and for all their effort they got no useful sightings from it. The narrative is not even clear as to whether they still had it when they finished their trip.

I just finished this book.

Lewis bought the chronometer from a Thomas Parker in Philadelphia in 1803. He paid for $250 it, "by far the largest sum expended for any single item carried on the expedition." Further in the book: "Though Lewis had bought the best available [chronometer] in Philadelphia, it was not reliable." There is one mention of his having forgotten to wind it when he "..was so busy with the Indians." His instruments included "two Sextants, an artificial horizon or two; a good Arnold's watch or chronometer, [my emphaisis] a Surveyor's compass with a ball and socket and two pole chain, and a set of plotting instruments." Dr. Jon is correct - there is no mention in this book of the chronometer's disposition or whether it even survived to return to St. Louis.

There is more about Lewis's celestial work and Clark's cartography. But this book is documentary not technical analysis and I don't want to hijack the thread.