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by Watchking
There are quite a few issues here but perhaps I can comment on a few of the
more salient considerations. Quartz watch drive systems are much lower in
inertia compared to mechanicals. One of the reasons why Accutrons are not being
made today is because this hybrid intermediary inertia system could not be
sufficiently developed to overcome some of the major problems. With today's
battery technology Accutrons SHOULD be feasible but alas ....
If you look carefully at any mechanical watch with an operating frequency
below 32,400 vph you will see that there is a barely perceptible rebound
(backwards) movement to the second hand. Unlike tower clocks whose second hands
are damped in their forward movement, most watch second hands are undamped to
some degree. This puts a piece of metal in motion to bang up against another
piece of metal (not counting detent chronometers of course where the banging
metal occurs internally and the second hand is released not revolved). This
banging is what creates the second hand jitter which is additional to the
stuttering movement.
In a quartz watch the second hand is propelled forward by a pulse like a
regulator clock in a school or train station. The second hand is ultralight
nowadays (unlike a mechanical system with a second hand which
"balances" part of the escapement inertia and which would wiggle
incredibly if it was ultralight). Even at higher movement rates the second hand
on a quartz mechanism wouldn't look like the second hand on a mechanical watch.
In addition mechanical watches tick. The ticking effect is real, just watch
the reaction of a puppy to a loud mechanical alarm clock that it can have for
its own. With the right teething handle on the clock the puppy may want to carry
it around "for company". So do puppies prefer tickers to digital pulse
systems, well ... they used to. Now with lift activated "talking
clocks" using the owners voice, the puppy would much prefer to carry the
box "with the bigger dog's voice" around "for company"
instead of the ticker. Mechanical watches can reassure the owner with sound and
whenever wearers were unsure of their mechanical watches they used to put them
up to their ear. This impulse reaction is fading from the culture due to quartz
watches which are usually go-nogo systems. There used to be watchmakers with
failing eyesight who could diagnose movement problems simply by listening to the
movement.
So the real issue here is what people's expectations are with quartz watches
and could they be fulfilled. The 1/10 second quartz module already exists and
could easily be incorporated into a watch. Jaeger and Seiko both have prototypes
and test runs in the field for testing. The battery isn't a problem although the
cost for the new tooling is a consideration. The smooth flowing second hand of
the Accutron did have its fans. A watch made for Lucien Piccard had a vibration
rate of 39,600 vph and it's second hand seemed to flow as well (although it is a
real pain to regulate). There will be enough fans to make this specialized
second hand a reality.
Will it overcome a fascination with ticking that humans have become
conditioned to expect over the last 500+ years, I don't know. Eventually it may,
but there are still ticking, ringing tower clocks all over Europe. People will
still have grandfather and cuckoo clocks in their homes. For the next hundred
years or so people may grow up (and thus be conditioned from childhood) in the
presence of a ticker. Minus this reassurance humans can feel a loss. Most likely
when we have talking response devices that tell us the time (and other things,
from birth, when we whack them, as sort of a baby's minute repeater with mama's
voice) only then will the mechanical ticker become less interesting and thus
more forgotten.
All transition periods are like this. The difference between tube sound and
transistors led some companies to "add" rounding distortion to their
"sound" to retain customers who complained about the dryness of
transistor sound. When CDs began to replace vinyl people claimed there was
something lost although they acknowledged something was gained. We humans need
accurate timekeeping to run our complex daily lives. In reality we don't need a
constant reminder of the passing seconds, but constant movement reassures us
that this important device is working, easing our insecurities. The 4 second
attention span of the MTV generation makes this amount of time about the limit
of our patience when we are determining if our "device" is working
(which is why Nintendo had to keep attention getting messages onscreen as game
programs loaded, or the audience thought the game player had broken).
There is nothing intrinsically "bad" about a one second pulse rate.
Old slow-beat fusee movement watches had 1 or 2 pulse per second advance rates
for their second hands. What is funnier was the clutch connected second hand
which could be stopped while the hour and minute hand continued to move
correctly. The second hand was only there as an accessory. I'm sure there will
be watches with quartz drives and flowing second hands available soon (so please
write your favorite watch company, except of course Blancpain, to hurry them
along). This will be a niche market item. It will out-MTV MTV. If the 1/10
second pulse interval is visible (unlike the synchronous motor clock second hand
which flows at 60 pulses per second) we might be able to respond to the pulses
which fascinate us. Like watching the activity of ants frantically building
nests, collecting food and fighting for territory, the pulsed/flowing second
hand may intrigue enough humans to inspire its own fan base in the market.
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