Master Clock Keeps Time For All Other Clocks

[Brett] just finished construction and long-term testing of this extremely accurate timepiece. It keeps such great time by periodically syncing with the atomic clock in Mainflingen, Germany.

The core of the project is an ATMega328 which uses the new DCF77 library for decoding the signal broadcast by an atomic clock. The libraries written by Udo Klein significantly increase the noise tolerance of the device reading the signal, but they will not work with any project that use a resonator rather than a crystal.

In the event of a complete signal loss from the atomic clock, the micro driving the clock also has a backup crystal that can keep the clock running to an accuracy of within 1 second per day. The clock can drive slave clocks as well, using pulses with various timings depending on what [Brett] needs them to do. The display is no slouch either: six seven-segment displays show the time and an LCD panel reads out data about the clock. It even has chimes for the hour and quarter hour, and is full of many other features to boot!

One of the most annoying things about timekeeping is daylight savings time corrections, and this clock handles that with a manual switch. This can truly take care of all of your timekeeping needs!