Telechron - Limitations of The Telechron Technology

Limitations of The Telechron Technology

From a commercial point of view, it was the increased durability of batteries as well as the invention of the quartz movement that proved fatal to Telechron. From the point of view of the history of technology, however, another problem is more crucial: if the electric power grid is used as a system for the "distribution of time," as Warren himself wrote, then, in the case of a power failure, the clocks stop, and the individual consumers' Telechrons lose their connection with the master clock (and, by implication, with the time provided by the Naval Observatory). If there is a temporary power outage while the owner is out, the running clock will display the incorrect time when he returns. Warren, foreseeing this difficulty, provided his clocks with an "indicating device": a red dot that would appear on the dial whenever the power failed. This red dot alerted the consumer to the need to reset the clock (by obtaining the accurate time through the telephone, for example, or from a radio). Setting the clock would reset the indicator. The electric clock market grew rapidly in the 1930s, and Telechron's patented power interruption indicator gave his clocks an advantage over competing synchronous clocks, but by the 1950s battery-operated clocks that weren't dependent on the power grid took market share, and in the 1960s the quartz clock replaced synchronous clocks.

In recent years the problem of how to keep clocks synchronized with primary standards has been solved with the radio clock, which receives time signals not through the electric grid, but from government time radio stations.