Good Questions Frank! You asked: 1. Why did you choose to have it facing south-west? [Do the locals not get up very early?] Answer: It faces southwest so that the northeast bound traffic on the road (Innovation Drive) can see the sundial while driving. But that was a good guess!
2. Why did you decide on 12 degrees as the offset from the vertical? Answer: The artist who designed most of the sculpture wanted the ring-shaped dial face to lean backwards simply for artistic reasons. It was my job to turn his modern sculpture into a working sundial. The hard part was designing a gnomon that wasn't attached to the face. I call it a "floating gnomon". 3. Also, I can see the cone at the lower end of the support tube and I deduce that the date scale is still being constructed. Do you have any pictures of the design or is that still a state secret? Answer: In my mind, I know how the Solar Noon Line will look and I have preliminary drawings. But I wanted to wait to make the final drawings until after the big ring dial was installed so that I could get super pricise measurements of the cone nodus location. The Solar Noon line will be a bronze plaque that sits on top of a triangular fin-shaped concrete pedestal. It tilts towards the south at an angle equal to the latitude (like a polar dial face). Because it slopes like this, the date lines the equinox mark is in the center of the line. Would you call this a "Polar Solar Noon Line" I wonder??? The date line still needs to be fabricated and installed. And the Sundial Plaza needs to be built and landscaped. All this will be done soon I hope! -----Original Message----- From: Frank King [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Sunday, May 15, 2011 9:56 AM To: John Carmichael Cc: 'Sundial List'; [email protected] Subject: Re: New Monumental Sundial in Oro Valley Dear John, That looks to be a monumental achievement in several senses! http://www.flickr.com/photos/jlcarmichael Judging by the photographs, you could have set this up with any orientation you liked so some questions: 1. Why did you choose to have it facing south-west? [Do the locals not get up very early?] 2. Why did you decide on 12 degrees as the offset from the vertical? Also, I can see the cone at the lower end of the support tube and I deduce that the date scale is still being constructed. Do you have any pictures of the design or is that still a state secret :-) I hope you have many more commissions in the pipe-line. All the best Frank --------------------------------------------------- https://lists.uni-koeln.de/mailman/listinfo/sundial
