Week 2 - The Design of Time

Implement Clock Design

I completely scrapped my poop clock idea/design because collecting the data led to inconclusive results. Instead, I decided to create a clock inspired by my childhood experience in my dad's village.

Concept

Growing up, there was a giant bell/clock tower in the village square that would ring on the hour. In the pre-cell phone era, you could tell the time outside your house counting how many times the bell struck, for example, 11 strikes meant 11am. This was a public communal timekeeper embedded in the acoustic landscape of daily life. Forgot to mention the village was on a side of the mountain and regardless how far you were from the square you would be able to hear the bell strike.

Technical Design:

My clock uses a mannequin arm attached to a rack and pinion mechanism (specifically mechanism #123 from 507 Mechanical Movements). A servo motor drives one of the gears, causing the rack and the mannequin arm attached to it, to move vertically, striking a bellhop bell mounted on a fixed platform below. An RTC (real-time clock) module triggers the servo to strike the bell appropriate number f times each hour.

I'm adapting an existing rack and pinion 3D model from Thingiverse and modifying it to accommodate the servo motor and mannequin arm attachment. Since I don't have prior 3D modeling experience, I'm learning to make these modifications as I build.

Documentation

I've attached sketches showing hte mechanical configuration. You can see the rack and pinion movement principle demonstrated in the animation of mechanism #123 here.

used the existing stl files from thingiverse and making modifications to the design on tinkercard created a bracket that would be able to hold the rack in place so it does not pop out

Note: I'm submitting one design rather than two, as I've already committed to this build and begun printing the components.

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Oven Clock UI Study

Physical Interface:

• One button to activate clock-setting mode (requires press-and-hold)

• Two separate increment buttons: one for hours, one for minutes

• No decrement buttons

Instructions for Setting the Clock:

1. Press and hold the clock button until the display begins flashing

2. While continuing to hold the clock button, press the HOUR button repeatedly to cycle through hours (1→2→3...→12→1)

   Note: If you overshoot your target hour, you must continue pressing through the full 12-hour cycle

3. Still holding the clock button, press the MINUTE button repeatedly to cycle through minutes (0→1→2...→59→0)

   Note: If you overshoot your target minute, you must continue pressing through all 60 minutes

4. Release the clock button to confirm the time

5. If you were to just press this button it would set a timer, not adjust the clock display

Thoughts on Podcast & Readings

The readings and podcast reinforced how timekeeping is never neutral both linguistic and technological frameworks shape how communities experience and organize temporal reality.