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Balance wheel
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Main page A balance wheel, or balance, is the timekeeping device used in

Contents mechanical watches and some clocks, analogous to the pendulum in a
Featured content pendulum clock. It is a weighted wheel that rotates back and forth,
Current events being returned toward its center position by a spiral torsion spring, the
Random article balance spring or hairspring. It is driven by the escapement, which
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transforms the rotating motion of the watch gear train into impulses
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delivered to the balance wheel. Each swing of the wheel (called a 'tick'
Interaction or 'beat') allows the gear train to advance a set amount, moving the
Help hands forward. The balance wheel and hairspring together form a Balance wheel in a cheap 1950s
About Wikipedia harmonic oscillator, which due to resonance oscillates preferentially at a alarm clock, the Apollo, by Lux Mfg. Co.
Community portal certain rate, its resonant frequency or 'beat', and resists oscillating at showing the balance spring (1) and
Recent changes regulator (2)
other rates. The combination of the mass of the balance wheel and the
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elasticity of the spring keep the time between each oscillation or ‘tick’
Tools very constant, accounting for its near universal use as the timekeeper
What links here in mechanical watches to the present. From its invention in the 14th
Related changes century until tuning fork and quartz movements became available in the
Upload file 1960s, virtually every portable timekeeping device used some form of
Special pages balance wheel.
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Page information Contents
Wikidata item
1 Overview
Cite this page
2 Terminology
Print/export 3 Period of oscillation
Create a book 4 History
Download as PDF 4.1 Addition of balance spring
Modern balance wheel in a watch
Printable version 4.2 Temperature error
movement
4.3 Temperature-compensated balance wheels
In other projects 4.4 Middle temperature error
Wikimedia Commons 4.5 Better materials
5 References
Languages
6 External links
‫اﻟﻌرﺑﯾﺔ‬
7 Footnotes
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Overview [edit]
Esperanto Until the 1980s balance wheels were the timekeeping technology used in chronometers, bank vault time locks,
Français time fuzes for munitions, alarm clocks, kitchen timers and stopwatches, but quartz technology has taken over
Italiano
these applications, and the main remaining use is in quality mechanical watches.
Nederlands
Polski Modern (2007) watch balance wheels are usually made of Glucydur, a low thermal expansion alloy of beryllium,
Svenska copper and iron, with springs of a low thermal coefficient of elasticity alloy such as Nivarox.[1] The two alloys are
Edit links
matched so their residual temperature responses cancel out, resulting in even lower temperature error. The
wheels are smooth, to reduce air friction, and the pivots are supported on precision jewel bearings. Older
balance wheels used weight screws around the rim to adjust the poise (balance), but modern wheels are
computer-poised at the factory, using a laser to burn a precise pit in the rim to make them balanced.[2] Balance
wheels rotate about 1½ turns with each swing, that is, about 270° to each side of their center equilibrium
position. The rate of the balance wheel is adjusted with the regulator, a lever with a narrow slit on the end
through which the balance spring passes. This holds the part of the spring behind the slit stationary. Moving the
lever slides the slit up and down the balance spring, changing its effective length, and thus the resonant
vibration rate of the balance. Since the regulator interferes with the spring's action, chronometers and some
precision watches have ‘free sprung’ balances with no regulator, such as the Gyromax.[1] Their rate is adjusted
by weight screws on the balance rim.
A balance's vibration rate is traditionally measured in beats (ticks) per hour, or BPH, although beats per second
and Hz are also used. The length of a beat is one swing of the balance wheel, between reversals of direction,
so there are two beats in a complete cycle. Balances in precision watches are designed with faster beats,
because they are less affected by motions of the wrist.[3] Alarm clocks and kitchen timers often have a rate of 4
beats per second (14,400 BPH). Watches made prior to the 1970s usually had a rate of 5 beats per second
(18,000 BPH). Current watches have rates of 6 (21,600 BPH), 8 (28,800 BPH) and a few have 10 beats per
second (36,000 BPH). During WWII, Elgin produced a very precise stopwatch that ran at 40 beats per second
(144,000 BPH), earning it the nickname 'Jitterbug'.[4] Audemars Piguet currently produces a movement that
allows for a very high balance vibration of 12 beats/s (43,200 BPH).[5]
The precision of the best balance wheel watches on the wrist is around a few seconds per day. The most
accurate balance wheel timepieces made were marine chronometers, which were used on ships for celestial
navigation, as a precise time source to determine longitude. By WWII they had achieved accuracies of 0.1
second per day.[6]

Terminology [edit]
In watchmaking the term "wheel" usually means a large gear with teeth on its periphery – great wheel, centre
wheel, third wheel, etc. The "balance wheel" has no teeth and therefore is not a wheel in this sense. Some
recognise this and refer to it as simply the "balance". For instance Jendritzki[7] (Swiss) and de Carle[8] (English)
use the term "balance" rather than "balance wheel". It appears that the term balance wheel is used in America,
although the great American watchmaker Henry Fried,[9] described in his obituary in The New York Times as
"the dean of American watchmakers" also used the term balance rather than balance wheel.

Period of oscillation [edit]

A balance wheel's period of oscillation T in seconds, the time required for one complete cycle (two beats), is
determined by the wheel's moment of inertia I in kilogram-meter2 and the stiffness (spring constant) of its
balance spring κ in newton-meters per radian:

History [edit]
Perhaps the earliest existing
drawing of a balance wheel, in
Giovanni de Dondi's astronomical
clock, built 1364, Padua, Italy. The watches after 1500, balance wheels began to be used in place of
balance wheel (crown shape, top) had
a beat of 2 seconds. Tracing of an
illustration from his 1364 clock
treatise, Il Tractatus Astrarii.
expansion error due to temperature changes.[12]
The balance wheel appeared
with the first mechanical clocks,
in 14th century Europe, but it
seems unknown exactly when or
where it was first used. It is an
improved version of the foliot,
an early inertial timekeeper
consisting of a straight bar
Foliot (horizontal bar with weights)
pivoted in the center with
from De Vick clock, built 1379, Paris
weights on the ends, which
oscillates back and forth. The
foliot weights could be slid in or out on the bar, to adjust the rate of the
clock. The first clocks in northern Europe used foliots, while those in
southern Europe used balance wheels.[10] As clocks were made smaller,
first as bracket clocks and lantern clocks and then as the first large
foliots.[11] Since more of its weight is located on the rim away from the
axis, a balance wheel could have a larger moment of inertia than a foliot
of the same size, and keep better time. The wheel shape also had less
air resistance, and its geometry partly compensated for thermal

Addition of balance spring [edit]

These early balance wheels were crude timekeepers because they lacked the other essential element: the
balance spring. Early balance wheels were pushed in one direction by the escapement until the verge flag that
was in contact with a tooth on the escape wheel slipped past the tip of the tooth ("escaped") and the action of
the escapement reversed, pushing the wheel back the other way. In such an "inertial' wheel, the acceleration is
proportional to the drive force. In a clock or watch without balance
spring, the drive force provides both the force that accelerates the
wheel and also the force that slows it down and reverses it. If the drive
force is increased, both acceleration and deceleration are increased,
this results in the wheel getting pushed back and forth faster. This made
the timekeeping strongly dependent on the force applied by the
escapement. In a watch the drive force provided by the mainspring,
applied to the escapement through the timepiece's gear train, declined
during the watch's running period as the mainspring unwound. Without Early balance wheel with spring in
some means of equalizing the drive force, the watch slowed down during an 18th-century French watch
the running period between windings as the spring lost force, making it
useless as a timekeeper. This is why all pre-balance spring watches
required fusees (or in a few cases stackfreeds) to equalize the force from the mainspring reaching the
escapement, to achieve even minimal accuracy.[13] Even with these devices, watches prior to the balance spring
were very inaccurate.
The idea of the balance spring was inspired by observations that springy hog bristle curbs, added to limit the
rotation of the wheel, increased its accuracy.[14][15] Robert Hooke first applied a metal spring to the balance in
1658 and Jean de Hautefeuille and Christiaan Huygens improved it to its present spiral form in 1674[12][16] The
addition of the spring made the balance wheel a harmonic oscillator, the basis of every modern clock. This
means the wheel vibrated at a natural resonant frequency or ‘beat’ and resisted changes in its vibration rate
caused by friction or changing drive force. This crucial innovation greatly increased the accuracy of watches,
from several hours per day[17] to perhaps 10 minutes per day,[18] changing them from expensive novelties into
useful timekeepers.

Temperature error [edit]

After the balance spring was added, a major remaining source of inaccuracy was the effect of temperature
changes. Early watches had balance springs made of plain steel and balances of brass or steel, and the
influence of temperature on these noticeably affected the rate.
An increase in temperature increases the dimensions of the balance spring and the balance due to thermal
expansion. The strength of a spring, the restoring force it produces in response to a deflection, is proportional
to its breadth and the cube of its thickness, and inversely proportional to its length. An increase in temperature
would actually make a spring stronger if it affected only its physical dimensions. However, a much larger effect
in a balance spring made of plain steel is that the elasticity of the spring's metal decreases significantly as the
temperature increases, the net effect being that a plain steel spring becomes weaker with increasing
temperature. An increase in temperature also increases diameter of a steel or brass balance wheel, increasing
its rotational inertia, its moment of inertia, making it harder for the balance spring to accelerate. The two effects
of increasing temperature on physical dimensions of the spring and the balance, the strengthening of the
balance spring and the increase in rotational inertia of the balance, have opposing effects and to an extent
cancel each other.[19] The major effect of temperature which affects the rate of a watch is the weakening of the
balance spring with increasing temperature.
In a watch that is not compensated for the effects of temperature the weaker spring takes longer to return the
balance wheel back toward the center, so the ‘beat’ gets slower and the watch loses time. Ferdinand Berthoud
found in 1773 that an ordinary brass balance and steel hairspring, subjected to a 60 °F (33 °C) temperature
increase, loses 393 seconds (6 1/2 minutes) per day, of which 312 seconds is due to spring elasticity
decrease.[20]

Temperature-compensated balance wheels [edit]

The need for an accurate clock for celestial navigation during sea voyages drove many advances in balance
technology in 18th century Britain and France. Even a 1-second per day error in a marine chronometer could
result in a 17-mile error in ship's position after a 2-month voyage. John Harrison was first to apply temperature
compensation to a balance wheel in 1753, using a bimetallic ‘compensation curb’ on the spring, in the first
successful marine chronometers, H4 and H5. These achieved an accuracy of a fraction of a second per day,[18]
but the compensation curb was not further used because of its complexity.
A simpler solution was devised around 1765 by Pierre Le Roy, and improved by John Arnold, and Thomas
Earnshaw: the Earnshaw or compensating balance wheel.[21] The key was to make the balance wheel change
size with temperature. If the balance could be made to shrink in diameter as it got warmer, the smaller moment
of inertia would compensate for the weakening of the balance spring, keeping the period of oscillation the same.
To accomplish this, the outer rim of the balance was made of a ‘sandwich’ of two metals; a layer of steel on the
inside fused to a layer of brass on the outside. Strips of this bimetallic
construction bend toward the steel side when they are warmed,
because the thermal expansion of brass is greater than steel. The rim
was cut open at two points next to the spokes of the wheel, so it
resembled an S-shape (see figure) with two circular bimetallic ‘arms’.
These wheels are sometimes referred to as "Z-balances". A
temperature increase makes the arms bend inward toward the center of
the wheel, and the shift of mass inward reduces the moment of inertia of
the balance, similar to the way a spinning ice skater can reduce her
Bimetallic temperature- moment of inertia by pulling in her arms. This reduction in the moment
compensated balance wheel, from an of inertia compensated for the reduced torque produced by the weaker
early 1900s pocket watch. 17 mm dia. balance spring. The amount of compensation is adjusted by moveable
(1) Moving opposing pairs of weights
weights on the arms. Marine chronometers with this type of balance had
closer to the ends of the arms
increases temperature compensation. errors of only 3–4 seconds per day over a wide temperature range.[22]
(2) Unscrewing pairs of weights near By the 1870s compensated balances began to be used in watches.
the spokes slows the oscillation rate.
Adjusting a single weight changes the
poise, or balance.
Middle temperature error [edit]
The standard Earnshaw compensation balance dramatically reduced
error due to temperature variations, but it didn't eliminate it. As first
described by J. G. Ulrich, a
compensated balance
adjusted to keep correct
time at a given low and
high temperature will be a Marine chronometer balance wheels from the mid-1800s, with various 'auxiliary
few seconds per day fast at compensation' systems to reduce middle temperature error
intermediate
temperatures.[23] The reason is that the moment of inertia of the balance varies as the square of the radius of
the compensation arms, and thus of the temperature. But the elasticity of the spring varies linearly with
temperature.
To mitigate this problem, chronometer makers adopted various 'auxiliary compensation' schemes, which
reduced error below 1 second per day. Such schemes consisted for example of small bimetallic arms attached
to the inside of the balance wheel. Such compensators could only bend in one direction toward the center of the
balance wheel, but bending outward would be blocked by the wheel itself. The blocked movement causes a
non-linear temperature response that could slightly better compensate the elasticity changes in the spring. Most
of the chronometers that came in first in the annual Greenwich Observatory trials between 1850 and 1914 were
auxiliary compensation designs.[24] Auxiliary compensation was never used in watches because of its
complexity.

Better materials [edit]

The bimetallic compensated balance wheel was made obsolete in the
early 20th century by advances in metallurgy. Charles Édouard
Guillaume won a Nobel prize for the 1896 invention of Invar, a nickel
steel alloy with very low thermal expansion, and Elinvar (Elasticité
invariable) an alloy whose elasticity is unchanged over a wide
temperature range, for balance springs.[25] A solid Invar balance with a
spring of Elinvar was largely unaffected by temperature, so it replaced
the difficult-to-adjust bimetallic balance. This led to a series of improved
low temperature coefficient alloys for balances and springs. Low-temperature-coefficient alloy
balance and spring, in an ETA 1280
Before developing Elinvar, Guillaume also invented an alloy to movement from a Benrus Co. watch
compensate for middle temperature error in bimetallic balances by made in the 1950s
endowing it with a negative quadratic temperature coefficient. This alloy,
named anibal, is a slight variation of invar. It almost completely negated the temperature effect of the steel
hairspring, but still required a bimetal compensated balance wheel, known as a Guillaume balance wheel. This
design later fell out of use in favor of single metal Invar balances with Elinvar springs. The quadratic coefficient
is defined by its place in the equation of expansion of a material;[26]

where;
 is the length of the sample at some reference temperature
is the temperature above the reference
is the length of the sample at temperature
is the linear coefficient of expansion
is the quadratic coefficient of expansion

References [edit]
"Marine Chronometer" . Encyclopædia Britannica online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. 2007. Retrieved
2007-06-15.
Britten, Frederick J. (1898). On the Springing and Adjusting of Watches . New York: Spon & Chamberlain.
Retrieved 2008-04-20.. Has detailed account of development of balance spring.
Brearley, Harry C. (1919). Time Telling through the Ages . New York: Doubleday. Retrieved 2008-04-16..
Glasgow, David (1885). Watch and Clock Making . London: Cassel & Co. Retrieved 2008-04-16.. Detailed
section on balance temperature error and auxiliary compensation.
Gould, Rupert T. (1923). The Marine Chronometer. Its History and Development. London: J. D. Potter.
pp. 176–177. ISBN 0-907462-05-7.
Headrick, Michael (2002). "Origin and Evolution of the Anchor Clock Escapement" . Control Systems
magazine, Inst. of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. 22 (2). Archived from the original on 2009-10-25.
Retrieved 2007-06-06.. Good engineering overview of development of clock and watch escapements,
focusing on sources of error.
Milham, Willis I. (1945). Time and Timekeepers. New York: MacMillan. ISBN 0-7808-0008-7.. Comprehensive
616 p. book by astronomy professor, good account of origin of clock parts, but historical research dated.
Long bibliography.
Odets, Walt (2005). "Balance Wheel Assembly" . Glossary of Watch Parts. TimeZone Watch School.
Archived from the original on 14 June 2007. Retrieved 2007-06-15.. Detailed illustrations of parts of a
modern watch, on watch repair website
Odets, Walt (2007). "The Balance Wheel of a Watch" . The Horologium. TimeZone.com. Archived from the
original on 6 July 2007. Retrieved 2007-06-15.. Technical article on construction of watch balance wheels,
starting with compensation balances, by a professional watchmaker, on watch repair website

External links [edit]

Choi, Fred (2007-05-26). "William Simcock Massey Type III pocket watch" . YouTube. Retrieved
2008-04-26. Video of antique mid-19th century watch showing the balance wheel turning
Costa, Alan (1998). "The History of Watches" . Atmos Man. Retrieved 2007-06-19. History of watches, on
commercial website.
Markl, Xavier (2016). "Monochrome-Watches A technical perspective the regulating organ of the watch" .
Monochrome-Watches A technical perspective the regulating organ of the watch
Oliver Mundy, The Watch Cabinet Pictures of a private collection of antique watches from 1710 to 1908,
showing many different varieties of balance wheel.

Footnotes [edit]
1. ^a b Odets, Walt (2007). "The Balance Wheel of a Watch" . The Horologium. TimeZone.com. Archived from the
original on 6 July 2007. Retrieved 2007-06-16.
2. ^ Odets, Walt (2005). "Balance Wheel Assembly" . Glossary of Watch Parts. TimeZone Watch School.
Retrieved 2007-06-15.
3. ^ Arnstein, Walt (2007). "Does faster mean more accurate?, TimeZone.com" . Retrieved 2007-06-15.
4. ^ Schlitt, Wayne (2002). "The Elgin Collector's Site" . Retrieved 2007-06-20.
5. ^ http://professionalwatches.com/2009/01/sihh_2009_jules_audemars_with.html
6. ^ "Marine Chronometer" . Encyclopædia Britannica online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. 2007. Retrieved
2007-06-15.
7. ^ Swiss Watch Repairer's Manual, Hans Jendritzki
8. ^ Practical Watch Repairing, Donald de Carle
9. ^ The Watch Repairer's Manual, Henry B. Fried
10. ^ White, Lynn Jr. (1966). Medieval Technology and Social Change. Oxford Press. ISBN 978-0-19-500266-9., p. 124
11. ^ Milham, Willis I. (1945). Time and Timekeepers. New York: MacMillan. ISBN 0-7808-0008-7., p. 92
12. ^ a b Headrick, Michael (2002). "Origin and Evolution of the Anchor Clock Escapement" . Control Systems
magazine, Inst. of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. 22 (2). Archived from the original on 2009-10-25.
Retrieved 2007-06-06.
13. ^ "Brittens Old Clocks & Watches" Edited by Cecil Clutton, G H Baillie & C A Ilbert, Ninth Edition Revised and
13. ^ "Brittens Old Clocks & Watches" Edited by Cecil Clutton, G H Baillie & C A Ilbert, Ninth Edition Revised and
Enlarged by Cecil Clutton. Bloomsbury Books London 1986 ISBN 0906223695 page 16
14. ^ Britten, Frederick J. (1898). On the Springing and Adjusting of Watches . New York: Spon & Chamberlain.
Retrieved 2008-04-16. p. 9
15. ^ Brearley, Harry C. (1919). Time Telling through the Ages . New York: Doubleday. Retrieved 2008-04-16. pp.
108–109
16. ^ Milham 1945, p. 224
17. ^ Milham 1945, p. 226
18. ^ a b "A Revolution in Timekeeping, part 3" . A Walk Through Time. NIST (National Inst. of Standards and
Technology). 2002. Archived from the original on 2007-05-28. Retrieved 2007-06-06.
19. ^ A.L. Rawlings, Timothy Treffry, The Science of Clocks and Watches, Publisher: BHI, ISBN 0 9509621 3 9,
Edition: 1993, 3rd enlarged and revised edition.
20. ^ Britten 1898, p. 37
21. ^ Milham 1945, p. 233
22. ^ Glasgow, David (1885). Watch and Clock Making . London: Cassel & Co. Retrieved 2008-04-16. p. 227
23. ^ Gould, Rupert T. (1923). The Marine Chronometer. Its History and Development. London: J. D. Potter. ISBN 0-
907462-05-7. pp. 176–177
24. ^ Gould 1923, pp. 265–266
25. ^ Milham 1945, p. 234
26. ^ Gould, p. 201.
 Authority control GND: 4570318-8

Categories: Timekeeping components

This page was last edited on 10 January 2018, at 16:15.

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