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| e-Ink for a clock face question. http://x404.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=26652 |
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| Author: | paulzolo [ Thu Jun 28, 2018 11:28 pm ] |
| Post subject: | e-Ink for a clock face question. |
Probably not what you think.. I was given a Chinese reproduction tall case clock. Not really a grandfather clock, but it's 7 feet tall. It's nice but has a few cosmetic things that need changing. One is the pendulum - way too nasty, so I'll be looking for a plain one. The other issue is the face. It's ghastly. It also suffered from having a complication printed on it. This got me thinking - there's space and potential there. My thoughts is that I'll take the current face out and make a new one. The place where a complication goes can be a real complication. I thought I could do something with a Raspberry Pi and an e-Ink display. The Pi could go to sleep between refreshes. Then I thought that the whole face could be a display. A new face every day! Even code it to create ones at random. I kind of like this idea. The problem being that the hands need a hole in the face for the shaft to go through. Apparently,mdisplays don't fare well if you drill holes in them. So I was wondering about tiling a few, leaving a gap for the shaft. The only problem here is that these displays don't seem to have the ability to sit flush against each other - there's a bezel around them, so the displays won't appear continuous. For me, an idea killer. So, I'll probably be giving the first idea thought, but the idea of a screen as a face has an attraction I like. |
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| Author: | John_Vella [ Fri Jun 29, 2018 6:26 am ] |
| Post subject: | Re: e-Ink for a clock face question. |
Silly question, but do you need "physical" hands? You could probably get software that would display very realistic looking hands, including shadows... I'm guessing. |
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| Author: | paulzolo [ Fri Jun 29, 2018 4:38 pm ] | |||||||||
| Post subject: | Re: e-Ink for a clock face question. | |||||||||
I like the idea of having real analogue hands, but being able to change the face. e-Ink flickers when you refresh it, and having that happen every minute would be distracting. |
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| Author: | big_D [ Wed Jul 04, 2018 12:23 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Re: e-Ink for a clock face question. |
Thinking outside the box, how about putting the hands on the outside of the face, but making them long enough, and with a blob in the middle, to make it look like they were centrally placed? You could do the minute hand as a long, black hand that reaches out to the rim, but the hour hand would either need to be fatter and full length, or you need to have a very fine, either silver or transparent part from the rim to the start of the "real" hand. Of course, this assumes you can locate a round eInk display of the right size. |
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| Author: | paulzolo [ Mon Jul 09, 2018 8:46 am ] | |||||||||
| Post subject: | Re: e-Ink for a clock face question. | |||||||||
There still need to be holes, though. This is a Chinese made copy/interpretation of a tall case clock, and while it has (or rather had - because I took them off) a pair of hanging weigths, they are purely ornamental. Weights would normally power such a clock, but not in this case. So, there are two holes in the face for the winding key, which complicates matters. I do like the idea of “suspendiong” the hands infrom of the face, but the problem arises when you need to adjust the time. Whatever wires you use to do this would need to deal with the resistance from the mechanism when the time is adjusted. They would be more visible than not. I think it’ll be a case of falling back to just the complication being a digital display. The fun of taking the mechanism out so that the face can be removed is interesting, as the back of the clock is nailed and glued shut. It’s almost as if they don’t want you to get in. |
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