Every Digital Clock Is Made Of Analog Components

In 2008, an art studio out of Stockholm released the ClockClock, a digital clock with an analog heart. The ClockClock used 24 individual analog clocks — hour and minute hands and all — to display time digitally. The world went crazy, Pinterest blew up, and everyone wanted a digital analog clock until the next interesting project distracted the masses.

This was ten years ago, and for a project that’s neck deep in stepper motors, timekeeping, and 3D printed parts, we haven’t seen a DIY project that puts these tools together to build a clone of the ClockClock. Until now, that is. [Wojtek] was inspired by the ClockClock and decided to make his own.

For the plastic bits, each of the 24 analog clocks are printed out of PLA. So far, it’s exactly what we would expect. The trick to the ClockClock is moving the hour and minute hand of each analog clock independently. This is done with a double shaft — just like a real clock — and two stepper motors. Each of the stepper motors are controlled by a single PCB in each analog clock with two 360° stepper drivers, a dual motor driver, and an ATMega328pb microcontroller. As a group, the individual analog clocks are controlled over I2C, with a single ‘satellite’ board serving as the master.

While there are a few details missing from this build, specifically how to attach the hands to the stepper motors, this is an amazing project. Someone finally built a ClockClock, and it didn’t cost thousands of dollars as the original did. You can check out some videos of the Analog/Digital clock below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNlFprewN-A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o0vmoWVZDw

8 thoughts on “Every Digital Clock Is Made Of Analog Components

  1. Digital doesn’t actual exist on its own; it is merely space that was intentionally left empty.

    It is the engineering version of negative space in visual arts. It only has meaning because of the positive space it is next to.

    Digital can exist because it is implemented in analog, and the designer promises to leave large, standardized spaces in between the parts, or in between the regions the parts are operated in. Thus, digital can only be surrounded by analog.

    Just as an empty canvas is not a painting, something purely digital is not electronics.

Leave a Reply

Please be kind and respectful to help make the comments section excellent. (Comment Policy)

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.