For the past few weeks, I’ve been blogging my assembly of the transistor clock which is now hanging on the wall of my new apartment. One of the most interesting aspects of that clock is how it keeps time.
Most clocks today use high precision crystal oscillators or dial out to some atomic clock somewhere (like your cellphone), but the transistor clock actually uses the 60Hz AC coming out of your wall socket to keep time. While this method was once common use, it’s certainly unconventional by today’s standards. I decided it would be fun to try to investigate exactly how accurate the 60Hz coming out of the wall is.