ANCR sundials, cast from recycled aluminum, use your exact latitude and longitude to plot the dial’s hour lines.
Our dials are calibrated using the laws of astronomy to calibrate the hour markers on the face of your dial. The gnomen (triangle piece on top) must also be precision machined to give you precise time keeping.
[Thanks, Mike!]
2 thoughts on “Location-specific sundials”
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First, you don’t need a clock to calibrate a sundial. Just make sure the sundial is horizontal and the gnomen (triangle piece on top) is pointing north. As a back up, line up the shortest sun shadow with noon, but this takes a bit more time…
Second, for all practical purposes the sundials are made by hand, but I use a computer to plot the hour lines. It’s pretty much standard trig, but tedious.
I then cut out a styrofoam pattern on a CNC router and, after packing the foam in foundry sand, pour in molten aluminum at 1450 degrees.
It’s similar to the lost wax process for jewelry.
Third, because good old planet Earth is rotating, tilted, and moving along an ellipse, a sundial’s lines must be plotted out based on latitude, longitude, and time zone.
Fourth, it’s kinda cool to come up with your own inscription.