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Thermally Powered Mechanical Wristwatch 147

Posted by michael from the crack-open-the-piggy-bank dept.
Raghu Mani writes "Theremally powered quartz wristwatches - which use minor temperature variations to generate electricity - have been around for a few years. Now here is something a lot more radical - a thermally powered mechanical watch. Invented by an American - Steven Phillips - it uses small temperature variations to wind the mainspring of the watch. A patent has been awarded for this - check out this link. A small article on the technology can be found here and the guy's own website is budapestwatchco.com. I doubt if any of us will be buying one of those watches anytime soon, though - just check out those prices ;-)."
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Thermally Powered Mechanical Wristwatch More

Thermally Powered Mechanical Wristwatch

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  • 1st post?? (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by xenocytekron ( 586678 )
    hmm will the body temperature affect it?
    • hmm will the body temperature affect it?

      It works on that basis. That's not so impressive. What IS impressive is that it is mechanical! See the whole thing on patent's page or my comment here. [slashdot.org]

  • Heh (Score:3, Funny)

    by B3ryllium ( 571199 ) on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @02:07PM (#4957517) Homepage
    Pfft! You're supposed to tell us about this BEFORE christmas!
  • Just find a way to joe cell my g-shock and i'll be happy.

  • A good patent (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @02:12PM (#4957539)
    Clever stuff like this DESERVES patents, not one click shopping and silly little algorythms.

    Luckily I live in a country with a sane patent system!

    • Re:A good patent (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Unless you are educated in the field of mechanical watch engineering, how could you decide whether this invention really deserves to be protected by a patent? This kind of feeling is exactly what is wrong with the patent system in general and particularly software patents: People who have no expertise in a certain application field decide what is and what is not patentable. An important part of the battle against software patents is about explaining the general problem with monopolies which are based on intellectual property. Software patents make the flaws of the current patent system more obvious, but they are in no way fundamentally different from "normal" patents.

      • Re:A good patent (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Rubbersoul ( 199583 )
        So do you think that we could save the patent system by maybe having things review by a committee made up of people in the related field? I am just curious as to how people think we could rework a broke (In my opinion system) to make it respectable again.
        • Patents are supposed to encourage people to solve problems that would not otherwise get solved. The system supposedly does this by allowing the solver to make money with the solution before others do. I am not familiar enough with the current system to analyze it very well, but might something like the following work better...

          Suppose that the first step in getting a patent is to state a problem and let it hang out there for some time (say 6 months). It would be the job of the patent office to compare the problem statement with previous problem statements and reject any that match too closely.

          For this watch, the statement might be "How can mechanical power be generated from thremal fluctuations using less than 20 cubic millimeters of space?"

          During the six months, the problem statement would be public and open to challenge so that any entity feeling that the statement poses too general a problem, or one already essentially solved, could submit a limited (say 2000 word) document explaining the challenge, and the PTO would take it into consideration. The challenger would have to pay a fee that more than covers the costs to the PTO to analyze the challenge.

          The PTO would accept or reject patent application problem statements based on whether or not the problem is specific enough and/or has already been solved. This still puts PTO analysts in a position better occupied by experts in a particular field, but rather than understanding the solution, they need only understand the problem. I think that would be an improvement.
    • I have seen temperture winding clocks from back in the 1960 - 1970 time frame. This has prior art.
      • I have seen temperture winding clocks from back in the 1960 - 1970 time frame. This has prior art.

        Clocks, perhaps...but watches? Given the difficulties often encountered when trying to scale mechanical systems down to smaller sizes, I doubt that claiming a thermally-powered clock as prior art WRT a patent on a thermally-powered watch would fly.

  • $109,000.00 (Score:4, Funny)

    by Scrameustache ( 459504 ) on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @02:13PM (#4957542) Homepage Journal
    Wow...

    I'm reeling from the thought that a watch can be worth more than my whole house.

    Better not forget it in your pants come laundry day...

    • Re:$109,000.00 (Score:3, Funny)

      by Petrol ( 18446 )
      I think he arrived at the base price by adding decimal places to his patent number.
    • Better not forget it in your pants come laundry day...

      I don't know about you, but I usually wear my watch on my wrist :p
    • I'm reeling from the thought that a watch can be worth more than my whole house.

      It may cost more than your whole house, that doesn't make it worth more.

    • Maybe that was "or best offer". Offer the guy $20.00 for one of his ridiculous watches and he just might take it.
    • > Better not forget it in your pants come laundry day...

      Don't worry. If you use a warm wash followed by a cool rinse cycle it should be fine. :-)

      Assuming it's waterproof, which for that ammount of cash it ought'a be.

  • Impressive.....but a collector's item (Score:3, Interesting)

    by slashuzer ( 580287 ) on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @02:19PM (#4957557) Homepage
    This is a collector's item, more than anything else. Just look at the claims in the patent, to give you some idea of the complexity!!

    This is a cool gadget. And for those wondering about body temperature.....

    The back of a watch embodying the invention is selected to be of a good heat conductive material, which will influence the temperature at the coil. Tests utilizing a thermometer strapped to a wrist, as a watch is, have shown the following temperature variations. When the watch is on the arm for the day, it is subjected to high temperatures due to body heat (on the order of ninety-five degrees). Most watches are worn slightly loose. When the back of the watch is essentially flush on the arm the temperature is up, on the order of ninety degrees F. Due to a slight shift on the arm, the case acts as a heat sink and the temperature drops three to six degrees F. This occurs about every fifteen minutes at room temperatures of seventy-five to seventy eight degrees. In addition there are fluctuations in room temperature due to cycling of the heating or air conditioning thermostats. The changes in temperature at the watch are more frequent and at a wider range when the watch is worn outside. It was found that the temperature at the watch was ninety degrees plus five degrees and minus ten degrees on a day when the outside ambient temperature was fifty degrees, all temperatures being Fahrenheit. When the watch is removed at night and subjected only to ambient room temperature it will very quickly drop to ambient room temperature, usually about seventy degrees. During the night the temperature will cycle with fluctuation in room temperature as the thermostatically controlled heat cycles. When the wearer again puts on the watch in the morning, there will be an increase in temperature of the watch casing back up to the external body temperature of the wearer. Change in temperature in either direction will produce self-winding of a watch embodying the invention.

    Truly a perpetual watch!

    • Re:Impressive.....but a collector's item (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Most certainly not perpetual. If there were no temperature variations the watch wouldn't run. Somewhere, there must be an activity occuring that produces heat. If the watch was frozen solid its temperature wouldn't change, hence the watch wouldn't run.
    • If you stopped eating for long enough, I bet that the watch would stop also...
  • U.S. watchmaker Steven Phillips patented a power supply for mechanical watches that requires only small changes in temperature to keep the watch in continual operation.

    The first of its kind for mechanical watches, the power system is called "Eternal Winding System," and will be placed in several watches made by Phillips at his company, Budapest Watch Co., Guilford, CT.

    Under development since early 2000, and granted a worldwide patent late this year, the watch and the power supply join as the first fully mechanical wristwatch that requires neither winding nor wearing to operate.

    While several Japanese manufacturers offer watches that use temperature variations to operate quartz (non-mechanical) movements, Phillips says he is the first to develop the technology for a mechanical watch movement.

    Similar to a mechanical thermostat, where a metal coil expands and contracts depending on the air temperature, Phillips developed a metallic coil with proprietary components so sensitive they will expand or contract at the slightest temperature variation. The movement of this coil, whether expanding or contracting, is transferred to a mainspring, the heart of a mechanical watch.

    "Since there is no stopping the power, this system is well suited for perpetual watches," says Phillips, who makes the watches by hand. Phillips says the first watches using the new technology will premier at the Basel Show 2003, April 3-10. Details are in current issues of International Wristwatch magazine, a U.S.-based watch publication for consumers, www.internationalwristwatch.com. Later this month, details will be available at www.budapestwatch.com.

    by Michael Thompson

  • Prices aren't so out of line (Score:5, Insightful)

    by shoppa ( 464619 ) on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @02:21PM (#4957563)
    The prices asked (a few $10000) aren't too far out of line for what is essentially a custom-built watch. I don't think that the self-winding technology is setting the price, just the low production quantities.

    For comparison, the Pulsar [si.edu], the first digital watch the on the market, cost $2100. A couple years later digital watches were under $20 from Texas Instruments [si.edu], and just a couple of years after that TI was out of the watch business because they couldn't compete against $4 imports.

    This isn't saying that self-winding watches will take off in the same way; it's just comparing the prices of mass-production stuff versus very low rate production.

    • The diamonds set in some of them might have something to do with the high prices too. ;)
    • I don't think that the self-winding technology is setting the price, just the low production quantities.

      New technology, limited quantity, hand made by the inventor. Case is 18 karat gold.

      There are lots of things affecting the price here.
    • Are you really trying to imply that it cost $64,000, $79,000, and $109,000 to produce each of these watches? The technology is kind of cool, I'll admit. But the whole company smacks of marketing one-ups-manship, and status symbol for the ultra-rich. People buy these sorts of things so they can display their wealth, so the more it costs and the better the name or feature that makes it cool, the more the maker can charge.

      Point being that I'm sure it cost a lot to develop the technology, make a limited run, etc. But if you're implying the price mostly reflects the cost of manufacture, I think you're dreadfully wrong.

  • Spell Checker. (Score:2, Funny)

    by dsb3 ( 129585 )
    At those prices, you'd think he could afford a spell checker. I've been reading the site for 5 minutes and already found 3 errors.

  • I can see they are of great quality, ( all the best timepieces ARE mechanical ) and are worth quite a bit ..

    But 100k??? That is a bit steep, even for this ....

  • Hey, Santa, get your fat ass down here, you forgot to give me one of those!

    Seriosuly, though, that is probably one of the coolest pieces of tech I've seen this year.

  • Buy a 9$ watch, spend 20000$ on batteries, save yourself 9991$ compared to the prices of their watches.

    Tom
  • A patent has been awarded for this

    Criminy. They'll give patents for ANYthing these days...

  • I just unwrapped a fancy Casio "wave-ceptor" watch that synchronises with atomic clocks by radio this morning ... and now it is obsoleted!!

  • Memory metals?? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by t0qer ( 230538 ) on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @02:44PM (#4957624) Homepage Journal

    Here's a link [memorymetals.co.uk],
    Here's a link [nasa.gov],
    why don't I just
    [google.com]
    link the google search page?


    Anyone remember memory metals? They were sort of a greeting card fad for a
    while..You would mail a loved one what looked like an unbent paper clip, with
    instructions to dip it into hot coffee. Upon hitting the hot coffee the metal
    would bend itself into a message. Really neat stuff if you ever got to play with
    it.


    • You know, when I was a kid I remember reading about these in some magazine. The article indicated that NASA was running a contest (sort of). Send in an idea of how to use these things and they'd send you a piece. Didn't matter how dumb the idea was (it *was* a kids magazine). My friend and I sent in ideas, he got his piece of wire and I never got mine. Bastards. Never got his wire to do much anyways...
    • The stuff isn't gone yet-- my glasses are made out of memory metal. It's fun bending them in half to suprise people.
    • I'm pretty sure this invention doesn't use memory metals. From skimming the patent, the power source for this watch movement seems to be a bimetallic coil spring. The different coefficients of thermal expansion of the metals cause the spring to coil or uncoil when it is heated or cooled. An escapement mechanism is probably used to connect this spring to the mechanical movement, so that regardless of whether the spring is coiling or uncoiling, it winds the watch.

      All in all, I have to say its a pretty clever idea, but I'm surprised no one thought of it before. Bimetallic strips have been used to regulate mercury switches in thermostats for many years, and most mechanical clock and watches need an escapement so that the swinging of the pendulum or the oscillation of the spring only drives the movement forward and not backward.
    • I have a couple of spools of ninitinol (sp?) somewhere. A memory metal that contracts or expands when you apply current.

      -psy

  • Not the first... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by dbitter1 ( 411864 )
    My (now departed) grandfather recieved an Omega watch as a retirement present ~1950. It, too, never required winding and sure as hell wasn't $10K (or whatever, adjusted for inflation)

    . I never bothered to open it and play with it, but he said it had something to do with the pendulum action of your arms... Still works like a charm today.

  • Rolex...17 years old and still sweeping (Rolex's don't tick).
    • Yes they do. At 8 times per second that comes to 28800 ticks per hour. All mechanical watches "sweep" with some slower than 28800vph, and some faster.

      If you have a Rolex you should be able to actually see the ticks and if you put it up to your ear, you can hear and actually count the 8 ticks per second.
      • Actually I realized that, I was more alluding to the distinctive tick of Quartz movement in a play on words from the Timex commercials, takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

        Also made in reference to the fact that the primary means of telling most fake Rolexs from real ones is the Quartz movement that most fake ones have.
    • Wait a few years and this invention might be *in* a Rolex. Steven Phillips is actively shopping his invention around to various big watch companies. If one of them bites then you'll see $3K watches with this technology in it.

      - HCE
  • See also Google('atmos clock') [google.be].

    Well, it's a little heavier than a wristwatch ;-), but it is also a temperature powered clock manufactured since the late 1920's (history of the Atmos clock [atmosclocks.com]).
    • Actually, the Atmos movement is powered not by thermal changes, but by pressure changes. There is a sort of 'bellows' on the back that gets cycled by barometric changes, which in turn winds the mainspring. Being a product of Jaeger LeCoultre, one of the top watch houses in Europe, they are (a) expensive, and (b) beautiful. I love mine.
  • Excellent, now we finally can have mechanical power generated from temperature fluctuations. All we need now is some sort of a machine to convert mechanical power into electrical and we have a new type of energy generator... hmmmm ... but where to get such a machine?!

  • While these custom watches are, the idea and principals themself are not. Nor is this a new fad or anything else, I still have a mechanical watch from 1955, that requires no winding.

    Funny enough, it's a Timex. It was my grandfathers, and I still wear it. After 20 years in the foundry of grit, grime, grunge, and other assorted toxic chemicals, it still works as good as the day he bought it.

    I won't be surpised if this is moderated as redundant. If you feel it is, reply. It's easy to moderate, wiser to reply with something witty or intellegent.

    --
    Be a smart poster, always check "No Score +1 Bonus"
    • Yep, you're right. I was just about to make a similar post myself.

      The temperature differential thing is new and neat, but other types of self-winding mechanical watches have been around for more than fifty years.

      I have a handsome "Clipper Automatic" watch that my father used to wear all the time. Like most self-winding watches it's kept wound by movement of the arm and wrist. The mechanism still works even after years of sitting forgotten in a drawer.
  • ... you would automatically help the investigators by telling them when exactly have you died....
    • Read the article. That will only apply if you die in a freezer... most self-winders are powered by motion, this is not. That is the point of the patent, that it is a different, innovative way to power a watch.

      Granted, it seems like an out of place innovation.. with all sorts of electronic perpetuals out there, using thermal or solar, or motion, including $300 Citizens that can operate unworn for 3 years, this doesn't exactly solve a problem that's out on the real-world market. But for the wealthy who MUST have a status symbol watch, this is a new way to set one up.

      But it won't stop when you do, and that's just the point.
    • ... Assuming you died in a place where the temperature never changes... like a vacuum?
  • This device is able to use human body heat to create enough usable energy to drive a fairly simple mechanical device.

    Let's extend this, playing futurist a bit. The same technology is applied to all the interior surfaces of your clothes, meaning that all your radiated body heat is put to use. Now, your wearable technologies need either smaller batteries, since they are trickle charged all day long by your body heat. Maybe your clothes have an air conditioner built in driven by body heat, maybe you just power a flat panel PDA on your wrist.

    I'd keep an eye on this type of technology...reclaiming wasted energy could have huge implications for portable technologies of all kinds.

    • ...winter clothing that use the much higher heat difference between the side next to the body and the side next to the winter cold while maintaining an usefull insulation...
    • Just as an argument on the air-conditioner side of things-- this device can't generate energy unless there's a temperature difference between the wearer's body temp and the outside temp. If you were in an environment where it's hot enough for an air conditioner to be worthwhile, chances are the temp difference between yourself and the outside world won't be enough to make any sort of air conditioner run. If the outside temperature is equal to your body temperature, the device is incapable of generating power. If the temperature outside is greater than that of your body, you have to be able to *absorb* more heat into your body in order to generate the power to run an air conditioner, which would make you pretty damn hot.

  • If you're into mechanical watches, check out www.timezone.com [timezone.com]. It's a website for watch geeks with an active message board.

    The Steven Phillips watches built here look awfully impressive. Too bad about the style, particularly the enamelling. There's a reason perlage is the standard movement decoration.
  • Do people still wear watches? With all of the devices that surround us every day that give the time and date, I'm surprised that watches are are sold and used any more.
    • I work in a lab with no windows, and I can't see the clock from my fume hood. On really busy days, my 11:00 watch alarm is the only reason that I remember to eat. I've also had our Validations department calibrate the stopwatch function on my watch using a NIST traceable timer so I can use it as an ISO approved assay timer. I like my watch.
      Damned if I'd spend 100K+ on one though...
  • Self-winding mechanical wristwatches have been around for decades. Granted, you have to wear it in order for them to wind themselves, but if you're going to pay $100,000 for a watch, you probably won't have more than one of them. (Well, although if you have $100,000 to spend on a wristwatch, you probably have $1,000,000 to spend on ten.)
  • They are just trying to get us fired up about so that when they start selling next month on thinkgeek [thinkgeek.com] they will make a load of money.
  • There is a much more detailed write-up on this in International Wrist Watch magazine (they have a website but the article is not there). Imagine an automatic wristwatch that does not even have to be wound but stays running all the time!

    What's more, a "side-effect" of this is that the watch has become vastly more accurate. The rate at which mechanical watches run is dependent on the tension in the mainspring - and since that isn't constant (even in regularly worn automatic watches) mechanical watches (even the most accurate ones) tend to lose or gain a few seconds a day.

    The "eternal winding" mechanism somehow manages to keep the tension in the mainspring fairly constant - so the watch's rate varies a lot less and it ends up being about as accurate as a quartz watch!

    The ridiculous price is only because these are a limited edition set of watches made by the inventor. According to the article, he intends to sell his patent to a bug watch manufacturer. If Rolex or Omega, for instance, gets hold of it, they will probably incorporate these in their regular watches and the price will, in time, come down to the same as regular Rolex/Omega prices (which aren't exactly cheap but not this expensive either).

    - HCE
  • I can think of some other applications for this device. For instance, aboard satellites and space probes -- many planets experience extreme fluctuations in temperature during their days (assuming this is a planet with a usable day length), and satellites will experience temperature fluctations as they pass in and out of earth's shadow.

    While these are basically the sort of things we us solar panels for now, this has the potential to be more robust and compact -- or maybe not, but they would still have certain advantages. For instance, on Mars, solar panels may suffer from dust deposition, while this wouldn't. They also wouldn't suffer as much from the effects of radiation exposure. On the other hand, I don't know how well it would scale up.

    There might be some terrestrial applications, too. For instance, for research you might want to power a sensor (temperature, wind speed, etc) in some remote location. Solar works fine when you're out in the open, but something like this could work in the middle of a shady forest, too.

  • Wow! (Score:2)

    by mtec ( 572168 )

    That is so cool! Uh, wait!
    No, no it's so hot, uh, cool...wait!

    *ducks*

  • I'll stick with my Seiko Kinetic, thanks (Score:4, Interesting)

    by frankie ( 91710 ) on Wednesday December 25, 2002 @09:23PM (#4958810) Journal
    Basically it derives energy from the temperature change when the watch is on top of your arm (flush against the skin == hotter) and when it's flopped to the side (exposed to air == cooler). In other words, it still needs motion to operate, albeit indirectly.

    Hence, my trusty kinetic watch [europastar.com] is effectively equivalent but a lot more affordable.

  • /. guys will power it by friction. ;)

    no more asking me what time it is to get my attention
  • Sooo... the watch will work from temperatue fluctuations from the environment, the human body or both (sorry, did not read the patent)?

    If it is the human body, doesn't it sounds like The Matrix's Duracell-human battery analogy :^) ? We could attach a gigantic watch into a cow and we'd have energy for a small house!!!!

  • What they said:
    What they meant:

    "You will be fortunate if you can get him to work for you."
    (We certainly never succeeded.)
    There is no other employee with whom I can adequately compare him.
    (Well, our rats aren't really employees...)
    "Success will never spoil him."
    (Well, at least not MUCH more.)
    "One usually comes away from him with a good feeling."
    (And such a sigh of relief.)
    "His dissertation is the sort of work you don't expect to see these days;
    in it he has definitely demonstrated his complete capabilities."
    (And his IQ, as well.)
    "He should go far."
    (The farther the better.)
    "He will take full advantage of his staff."
    (He even has one of them mowing his lawn after work.)

    - this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...

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