The radio signal, for clocks that can listen for it and set the time,
has it been offline today?

People call it the Rugby signal because it used to be transmitted from
there, but I think now it's transmitted from somewhere in Cumbria.

Unplugged a radio signal clock from the mains today and it took several
huors before it synced to the signal.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=)
(")_(")

On 16/04/2014 19:20, Mike Tomlinson wrote:

The radio signal, for clocks that can listen for it and set the time,
has it been offline today?

People call it the Rugby signal because it used to be transmitted from
there, but I think now it's transmitted from somewhere in Cumbria.

Unplugged a radio signal clock from the mains today and it took several
huors before it synced to the signal.

Yes:
http://www.npl.co.uk/science-technol...me/msf-outages

Peter

En el artículo , Peter Andrews
escribió:

Yes:
http://www.npl.co.uk/science-technol.../products-and-
services/time/msf-outages

Fantastic, thank you.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=)
(")_(")

What are the purposes of the time transmissions on the short wave bands.
They appear to be bleeps but near minuits and hours one can hear data and
even voices on some of them.
5Mhz etc.
Brian

--
From the Sofa of Brian Gaff Reply address is active
"Peter Andrews" wrote in message
...
On 16/04/2014 19:20, Mike Tomlinson wrote:

The radio signal, for clocks that can listen for it and set the time,
has it been offline today?

People call it the Rugby signal because it used to be transmitted from
there, but I think now it's transmitted from somewhere in Cumbria.

Unplugged a radio signal clock from the mains today and it took several
huors before it synced to the signal.

Yes:
http://www.npl.co.uk/science-technol...me/msf-outages

Peter

On Thu, 17 Apr 2014 09:33:09 +0100, Brian Gaff wrote:

What are the purposes of the time transmissions on the short wave bands.

Wide area frequency standards, the carriers are very accurate. Also
wide area coverage of accurate time information.

They appear to be bleeps but near minuits and hours one can hear data

"fast code" in MSF speak, though I think they have dropped that these
days, the "slow code" is easier to decode and less susceptable to
noise.

http://www.creative-science.org.uk/MSF2.html

Can't find the same information on the NPL site but that is a nice
mainly text page. 2 bits/second indicated by the duration the carrier
is off each second.

... and even voices on some of them.

Some legistures require a regular voice identification of the signal.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Wed, 16 Apr 2014 19:29:32 +0100, Peter Andrews
wrote:

On 16/04/2014 19:20, Mike Tomlinson wrote:

The radio signal, for clocks that can listen for it and set the time,
has it been offline today?

People call it the Rugby signal because it used to be transmitted from
there, but I think now it's transmitted from somewhere in Cumbria.

Unplugged a radio signal clock from the mains today and it took several
huors before it synced to the signal.

Yes:
http://www.npl.co.uk/science-technol...me/msf-outages

Peter


Hello,

Are there any kits to DIY your own clock? Maplin used to do one a
long, long time ago but I've not seen anything since.

Thanks,
Stephen.

On Thu, 17 Apr 2014 19:27:40 +0100, Stephen wrote:

Are there any kits to DIY your own clock? Maplin used to do one a long,
long time ago but I've not seen anything since.

This will give you the front end:

http://www.pvelectronics.co.uk/index...&products_id=2

decoding and display I leave up to you to find

GIYF

--

TOJ.

On Thu, 17 Apr 2014 19:27:40 +0100, Stephen wrote:

Are there any kits to DIY your own clock? Maplin used to do one a
long, long time ago but I've not seen anything since.

Cheap MSF clock from the likes of a pound shop or Lidl etc?

Ardino or Raspberry will decode without breaking sweat, I suspect a
PIC could do it. The display is probably the hardest bit.

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article ,
Stephen writes:
Hello,

Are there any kits to DIY your own clock? Maplin used to do one a
long, long time ago but I've not seen anything since.

I still have the Maplin kit (not in use).
I had it on a system running Interactive UNIX in the early 1990's,
and wrote a driver to decode the signal and synchronise the system.

During the period of debugging it, I could easily tell the time just
by listening to the carrier (shifted to audio frequency) - it's
easy to decode by ear. It spends most of the minute transmitting
what the time will be at the next minute boundary, at 1 bit/second.
I didn't decode the fastcode (encoding the date/time quickly in the
59th second), but it was subsequently removed from the signal anyway.
I did sit and listen to it through the GMT/BST changes - IIRC, it
starts sending a warning bit for an hour beforehand that the clocks
are about to change.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]