TIME-SIGNALS.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20334, 5 September 1931, Page 17

TIME-SIGNALS.

REPLACING TELEPHONE # SERVICE. ▲ DIFFICULT PROBLEM. Although it is hard to "believe that an inconvenience still exists which no mechanical device can overcome, it is a fact that no practicable means have yet been found of transmitting tt> the people accurate time-signals The announcement that the Post and Telegraph Department will no longer give its time service by telephone means the end of oh® dependable guide for the setting of : clocks. . How this eervice may be replaced makes an interesting problem. Although it is. stated that in some cities of the world a daily time-signal is conveyed by & momentary black-out; of electric lighting, there are many difficulties in such a plan. At whatever hour of the. night the power was 6witched off, manutacturing processes and perhaps surgical operations would be interrupted, and, if the black-out was -made before 11 p.m. (as it would havft to be) the tram service would be disorganised for. some.-minutes. An alternative might be for the lights' merely to be "flickered," but even this would necessitate some trouble at Lake Coleridge and might proive dangerous. Turning from electricity to "the telephone service, -it is declared impossible, . without special and _ costly ajyaratus, to convey a distinctive time-signal by: telephone; and this, in any case, would reach only telephone subscribers. Radio is a third good medium, but properly serving its purpose only if every house was suitably equipped. The best means of conveying timesignals to-day seem to be those which have been; used for many years- I —the loud-sounding clock, and the siren or whistle. But these have the disadvantage that if they are loud enough to be heard over wide area, they will al- S most certainly be objectionable toj people living near their place of origin. Electricians and chronological experts who were seen yesterday have no answer to the problem.