Abstract:
The disclosed solid state clock drive circuit comprises cascaded ring counters, whose stages comprise at least one heater element and one thermistor. A bistable switch, in response to timing pulses, alternately connects alternate stages of each ring counter to a current source such that energizing current flows through only one stage of each ring counter. Thermal coupling between the heater element and thermistor of adjacent stages controls the transfer of energizing current flow from stage to stage upon operation of the switches. A material applied to each heater element produces a visual effect when heated, thus developing a time display.
Abstract:
A synchronous self-starting timer motor having a disc shaped rotor with an annular ring of permanently magnetized poles about the periphery thereof. The magnetized poles are of alternately opposite polarity with the magnetic fields generated thereby being substantially perpendicular to the plane of the rotor. The stator includes a core having at least one pole pair which defines an axial air gap through which the magnetized annular pole portion of the rotor passes. Proximate each pole of the stator is a protrusion which extends in a direction parallel to the plane of the rotor and which perturbs the magnetic field passing between the poles such that the motor becomes selfstarting when exited by an electrical current. The stator also has an energizing winding which induces an alternating or pulsating flux field in the core of the stator which field coacts with the field of the rotor to drive the rotor at a speed proportional to the frequency of the flux field. The rotor has a low moment of inertia, is light in weight and has a large magnetic working area so that the synchronous motor is capable of generating high torque at a low input power level.
Abstract:
A synchronous reluctance motor particularly useful as a clock drive motor. The motor includes a stator having an airgap and a rotor having spaced teeth of magnetic material which travel in a circular path and pass through the airgap of the stator. A magnetic flux is established periodically in the stator airgap in timed relation to an approaching tooth. The timing is such that flux buildup in the airgap occurs when an approaching tooth is closer to the airgap than a receding tooth, and the flux is approximately zero when the tooth is at the center of the airgap. Hence, there is no retarding force on a tooth as it leaves the airgap. The pulsating flux is established, in one embodiment, by a power source which supplies periodic current pulses to the stator winding. In another embodiment, the power source has a sinusoidal wave form, and a magnetic shunt paralleling the stator airgap converts the sinusoid into a series of current pulses for energizing the stator winding.