![]() The tower has four clock faces, two of which are 43 m (141 ft) in diameter, at about 400 m (1,300 ft) high. The Abraj Al Bait, a hotel complex in Mecca constructed in 2012, has the largest and highest clock face on a building in the world, with its Makkah Royal Clock Tower having an occupied height of 494.4 m (1,622 ft), and a tip height of 601 m (1,972 ft). The NTT Docomo Yoyogi Building in Tokyo, with a clock added in 2002, has a roof height of 240 m (790 ft), and an antenna height of 272 m (892 ft). The building has a roof height of 187.68 m (615.7 ft), and an antenna height of 237 m (778 ft). Taller buildings have had clock faces added to their existing structure such as the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw, with a clock added in 2000. The clock tower of Philadelphia City Hall was part of the tallest building in the world from 1894, when the tower was topped out and the building partially occupied, until 1908. The tower stands at 100 metres (330 feet) tall and was completed in 1908. The tallest freestanding clock tower in the world is the Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower (Old Joe) at the University of Birmingham in Birmingham, United Kingdom. Old Joe in Birmingham, UK – the tallest freestanding clock tower in the world Line (mains) synchronous tower clocks were introduced in the United States in the 1920s. Al-Jazari's castle clock is considered to be one of the earliest programmable analog computer, along with the ancient Greek's Antikythera mechanism. Other components of the castle clock included a main reservoir with a float, a float chamber and flow regulator, plate and valve trough, two pulleys, crescent disc displaying the zodiac, and two falcon automata dropping balls into vases. It was possible to re-program the length of day and night daily in order to account for the changing lengths of day and night throughout the year, and it also featured five robotic musicians who automatically play music when moved by levers operated by a hidden camshaft attached to a water wheel. It included a display of the zodiac and the solar and lunar paths, and a pointer in the shape of the crescent moon which travelled across the top of a gateway, moved by a hidden cart and causing automatic doors to open, each revealing a mannequin, every hour. It was about 3.3 metres (11 feet) high, and had multiple functions alongside timekeeping. Īl-Jazari of the Artuqid dynasty in Upper Mesopotamia constructed an elaborate clock and described it in his Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices in 1206. Albans, in 1326, 'showed various astronomical phenomena'. The oldest surviving turret clock formerly part of a clock tower in Europe is the Salisbury Cathedral clock, completed in 1306 and another clock put up at St. In England, a clock was put up in a clock tower, the medieval precursor to Big Ben, at Westminster, in 1288 and in 1292 a clock was put up in Canterbury Cathedral. In Song dynasty China, an astronomical clock tower was designed by Su Song and erected at Kaifeng in 1088, featuring a liquid escapement mechanism. In its interior, there was also a water clock (or clepsydra), driven by water coming down from the Acropolis. The earliest clock tower was the Tower of the Winds in Athens which featured eight sundials and was created in the 1st century BC during the period of Roman Greece. The use of clock towers dates back to antiquity. As these structures fulfil the definition of a tower they can be considered to be clock towers.Ĭlock Tower, Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India Some clock towers were previously built as Bell towers and then had clocks added to them. It often marks the hour (and sometimes segments of an hour) by sounding large bells or chimes, sometimes playing simple musical phrases or tunes. The mechanism inside the tower is known as a turret clock. Not all clocks on buildings therefore make the building into a clock tower. A clock tower historically fits this definition of a tower and therefore can be defined as any tower specifically built with one or more (often four) clock faces and that can be either freestanding or part of a church or municipal building such as a town hall. Structures that do not meet this criterion, are defined as towers. According to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat a structure is defined as a building if at least fifty percent of its height is made up of floor plates containing habitable floor area. There are many structures which may have clocks or clock faces attached to them and some structures have had clocks added to an existing structure. A clock tower in the Helsinki Central Station
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