Victorian seamanship

Press, 30 November 1978, Page 17

Victorian seamanship

Perched on its promontory, the Timeball Station deserved to survive as an impressive piece of architecture. But it will greatly repay also a closer inspection, in spite of, outside, the disappointing stucco rather than stonework. Within, the station offers to visitors a rare opportunity to see a piece of nautical technology of Victorian times in operation. Only four other timeball stations, throughout the world, are known still to be in working order. The timeball mechanism itself is contained in the tower of the building. The top section of the spiral stone steps is built around the cast iron cylinder within which is the piston controlling the ball’s descent. Pefore a time signal could be given, the ball had to be hoisted by hand, using a rack and pinion system, to the top of the mast. It was then lowered on to a catch. At the appointed time the catch was released by an elec-tro-magnet and the ball began its slide down the mast.

The ball had to fall quickly enough to give a precise, obvious signal but not so quickly that it was dam-

aged when it landed on the buffers at the foot of the mast

The ball was, therefore, connected by a long metal rod to a piston in the cast iron cylinder. A lap at the bottom of the cylinder allowed the air to escape at a controlled rate as the piston descended.

All the bronze, cast iron, and steel machinery in the tower is original. The only item which had to be replaced was the iron and copper electromagnet which was stolen by vandals some years ago. The 100-kilogram hollow zinc ball on top of the tower is also original. I; was of this considerable "ize to enable its descent

to be observed from the heads.

The timeball mechanism was made by the German electrical engineering firm, Siemens, which still exports machinery to New Zealand. The rest of the mechanism used to control the timeball is in the clock room. In that room is a Dent’s astronomical clock which was sent out from London in 1874. (The same firm built Big Ben). The clock was wired so that at the appointed time three contacts closed together to activate the electro-mag-net that controlled the catch on the mast. The clock was used until 1916, its accuracy being maintained by way of telegraphed signals from the Colonial (later Dominion) Observatory in Wellington. In that year, the system was changed to allow the catch on the

mast to be released by a telegraphed signal which came directly from Wellington, bypassing the Timeball Station’s own clock. The clock itself was sent to Wellington to enable the observatory there to keep a better check on time; a new clock for Wellington was unobtainable because of the war. With the building restored. the clock recovered, and the equipment back in working order, Lyttelton can boast a rare attraction. Canterbury, for its part, owes a considerable debt to the enthusiastic individuals who, rather than see this link with New Zealand’s past lost, banded together to form the association which deserves as much credit as the Historic Places Trust for the success of the project.