Slashdot Mirror
Thermally Powered Mechanical Wristwatch
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 ;-)."
Loophole spoted. This only covers energy sources which are subject to angular deflection. Use something like a smaller version of the temperature-compensated pendulum and you get liner deflection not covered by the patent. You can convert that o angular using a rack-and-gear if you need angular to drive the mechanism.
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.
The mechanism behind a thermal self-winding mechanical watch and a thermally-powered electrical watch are probably quite different. From skimming the patent, it seems that the thermal self-winding mechanical movement uses the thermal winding of a bimetallic spring to wind the mechanical movement of this watch (sort of like how a bimetallic spring is used to regulate a mercury switch in many thermostats). A thermally-powered electrical watch probably uses the voltage generated across a bimetallic junction to drive the quartz oscillator (which is more akin to a Peltier cooler run in reverse). I agree that, while the idea is clever, it does not deserve patent protection for the next twenty years. On the other hand, the market for this type of invention is pretty small, and other watch makers are free to continue manufacturing other types of self-powered movements (self-winding, kinetic generators, thermoelectric, etc.), so granting the patent does not especially harm the market.
"It take 9 months to bear a child, no matter how many women you assign to the job."
If you're into mechanical watches, check out www.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.
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