Fellow diallists,
I suppose that I am starting to sound like a recruitment drive for
the British Sundial Society. Be that as it may. I must confess to
LOVING the early geometric descriptions of dials. Wonderful stuff.
BUT, all too often, they are difficult to follow.
The Bulletin of the BSS has had articles on how to make a range of
dials. The instructions are in modern English, and are generally
straightforward to follow.
This is a rather vexed question: how faithfully should we follow the
early craftsmen and instrunment makers? In my workshop I have a small
milling machine, a medium-sized lathe and a baby lathe (Unimat 3,
best thing since sliced bread!). I have two rotary tables (one I made
myself) capable of dividing a circle into rather tiny bits (don't ask
me how small, I don't know! But I could go down to 1000 divisions
with no problem, other than tedium.) I can drive to the metal store
and buy good sheet brass, etc. The craftsmen had none of this. They
divided circles with dividers (before Ramsden's WONDERFUL engine) and
engraved by hand.
Or did they?
By now we all know that a signature does not mean the personal work
of the owner of teh workshop. But it is an indication that it was
made there, and passed the scrutiny of the instrument maker.
How faithfully should I follow this tradition? Should I attempt to
decipher the arcane geometric descriptions of early diallists, or use
the modern computer programs (Thanks to people like Fer de Vries),
print the design onto clear film, put a photosensitive coating onto
my brass, and expose the design to the sun, wash off the coating,
and etch. Voila, a sundial.
Or, use my modern tools in the same endeavour?
The answer of course is that if Butterfield had access to my
workshop, he would use EVERY tool in it, and rejoice at the cheap
price we pay today for the precision!
So what? Well, as much as I admire the early descriptions, they are
often so obscure as to be impossible to follow. Try reading Chaucer's
expostion on the astrolabe! Far better to admire the early work, but
to USE the modern descriptions.
And for a great range of modern material, read the Bulletin of the
British Sundial Society!
John
(PS: Although I am a bit of a traditionalist, I admire our fellow
diallists who conjure up such aestehetically wonderful designs as teh
helical dials. Thanks for the inspiration!)
Dr John Pickard
Senior Lecturer, Environmental Planning
Graduate School of the Environment
Macquarie University, NSW 2109 Australia
Phone + 61 2 9850 7981 (work)
+ 61 2 9482 8647 (home)
Fax + 61 2 9850 7972 (work)
