Platform Escapement With Inclined Balance Wheel Axis
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing watch movements with balance-springs and inclined tourbillon cages face challenges in minimizing volume while maintaining watertightness and optimal balance wheel operation.
Innovation Solution
The escapement holder design features a base, balance bridge, and escapement bridge with a tilted balance wheel axis, forming a right-angled triangle cross-section, allowing for reduced thickness and volume, and optimizing spatial conditions for the balance wheel and components.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a tourbillon cage with inclined balance is used, then position sensitivity is reduced, but the volume required increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The balance wheel is inclined at an angle of 30° to 60° relative to the plane of the movement, utilizing the third dimension (vertical inclination) to achieve position insensitivity without increasing the horizontal footprint. This dimensional change allows the balance to operate effectively in multiple positions while maintaining a compact overall volume.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the orientation parameter of the balance wheel from the conventional horizontal plane to an inclined plane at 30°-60°. This parameter modification enables the balance to compensate for positional variations while occupying less volume than a traditional tourbillon cage configuration.
2Shape
If the movement is designed to wrap the wrist with domed shape, then aesthetic appeal and thin profile are achieved, but creating a watertight case becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The movement is divided into modular components (plate, bridge-plate, escapement holder with base and balance bridge) that can be assembled and sealed as integrated units. This segmentation allows for precise sealing interfaces while maintaining the desired domed aesthetic shape of the overall movement.
3Device complexity
If the balance wheel axis is perpendicular to the movement planes, then the structure is simple, but the thickness and volume cannot be minimized
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of orienting the balance wheel axis perpendicular to the movement planes (conventional configuration), the invention tilts the axis at 30°-60° relative to the plane. This reorientation in three-dimensional space allows the balance wheel to occupy less thickness in the vertical direction while maintaining functional simplicity.
Data Source
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AI summary
The mechanism has a balance wheel (30) fixed in frames formed by a plate (10), a bridge plate (11), a base (20), a balance bridge (22), and an escapement bridge (24). An escape wheel (26) and a spud (28) support the wheel (30). A clockwork movement (14) connects a turret (12) to the wheel (26), the spud and a timer. The wheel (30) turns around an axis inclined with respect to reference planes, and intersects the reference planes. An intersection point of the axis with the former plane is closer to a centre of the mechanism than another intersection point of the axis with the latter plane.