The emergence of watch

In the second half of fifteenth Century, Italy has emerged about the watch records, this was mainly due to the invention .By the beginning of the sixteenth Century, France and Germany also has emerged about the watch records such as the most famous of the German "Nuremberg egg", it has the egg shape and only an hour hand. In this period of so-called watch, it mainly refers small timers using remontoir power and escapement mechanism. But they have formed the rudiment of a pocket watch. After the middle of the sixteenth Century, the metal balance wheel appeared, it gradually replaced the pendulum rod early located on the shaft as a speed control device, so in the early watch of seventeenth Century, we have been able to see balance wheel device rotating in the movement.

 

Eighteenth Century is the golden period of watch development; there are many inventions of watchmakers that were used in all kinds of works. In the UK, John Harrison (1693-1776) produced a series of nautical chronometer watch, so that the accuracy of the clock reached a high level, because the travel-time accuracy greatly was improved, pocket watch in this period have taken the second hand. In 1704, Jacob Debaufre and NicolasFatio di Duillier (1654-1753) initiated jewel bearing; to a certain extent it reduced the movement of the friction between the gear and the splint. About 1760 French Jean Antoine Lepine (1720-1814) made a movement, the revolutionary change for the traditional multi-layer plywood structure, so watch’s thickness was thinned, historically which is called "Lepine machine", and then the movement holder plate arrangement of many pocket watch was influenced by"Lepine machine”. At the same time, the Swiss watch craftsmen were also exploring new areas, around 1770, Abraham-Louis Perrelet (17290-1826) invented the mechanical timekeeper of automatic winding up, and he became the pioneer of the automatic watch. The famous clock master -- Abraham-Louis Breguet (1747-1823) also was born in this period clock prosperous. In the late eighteenth Century, he invented the "Tourbillon" mechanism, in the past 200 years, this mechanism has always been considered to be one of the most complicated mechanical watches’ devices. Abraham-Louis Breguet in world horological history was known as the “Saint of the watches.” The middle of the eighteenth Century, the United States that was away from the European also appeared a watch craftsman; they later created condition for American watch industry.