UNIVERSAL TIMEPIECE

Abstract: The present invention relates to a universal timepiece including a circular base plate in which 24 division indexes are displayed with the same angle, an hour hand, and a region plate where names of regions in the world or symbols of the names and a date boundary line are displayed in a circumference of the timepiece. The base plate is divided into upper and lower half parts by a color or line. A noon symbol is displayed on a top of the upper half part, and an afternoon symbol and the International Date Line are displayed on the base of the lower half part. The region plate is formed at inside or outside of the base plate with a concentric circle. The universal timepiece enables a user to directly grasp the present time of chief cities and regions, an altitude of the sun, and change or no of the date.

Description: Title of Invention UNIVERSAL TIMEPIECE Technical Field The present invention relates to a universal timepiece and, more particularly, to a timepiece that enables a user to grasp the present time of global main cities or regions, an altitude of the sun, and whether a date is changed or not. Background Art Currently adopted time all over the world is the apparent solar time that is a southing-to-southing interval of the sun. In the apparent solar time, the interval is one day that is divided into 24 hours each being divided into 60 minutes. And the International Date Line is determined by defining a region of longitude 0° as noon (12 a.m.) and a region of longitude 180° as midnight (12 p.m.) when the sun southes to the Greenwich Astronomical Observatory (longitude 0°). Since the rotation (360°) of the earth takes 24 hours, longitude 15° corresponds to an hour. When viewed in the earth, the sun moves from left to right. For that reason, if the sun is positioned at the west on the basis of the Greenwich Astronomical Observatory, the time is as late as "15/longitude". Meanwhile, if the sun is positioned at the east on the base of the Greenwich Astronomical Observatory, the time is as early as "15/longitude". For example, when the Greenwich Astronomical Observatory is at noon, Baghdad and Tokyo positioned in the east therefrom are at 3 o'clock p.m. and 9 o'clock p.m., respectively. And when the Greenwich Astronomical Observatory is at noon, New York and Sydney positioned in the west therefrom are at 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. the day before, respectively. With the rapid advance of traffic and communication in the present time, an opportunity of world tour is increasing. Global interchange becomes frequent by virtue of telephone or Internet. As a result, there is an increasing need for grasping correct time of each city in the world. In order to meet the above need, various methods for grasping the present time of each city in the world have been suggested. The simplest method is to use a so-called "World Time Difference Table" in which world chief cities are displayed and times of the cities are displayed thereunder with 24 lines making an hour as a unit. Unfortunately, it is complicated to calculate the times of other cities with reference to the "World Time Difference Table". Further, it is not easy to have the "World Time Difference Table". Alternatively, an electronic clock was suggested in which the present time information of the chief cities in the world is memorized. Although the times of the cities can be grasped without calculation, the electronic clock has a shortcoming to require separate handlings. Any office keeping in touch with foreign countries is equipped with lots of clocks each displaying the time of each city in the world, which requires space and cost. A recently developed product automatically displays the present time of each city on a longitude passing a datum line when rotation of a terrestrial globe, but is not portable due to its great volume (International Publication No. WO9936837). Japanese Laid-Open Patent No. 3-287092 discloses a clock adopting a 24- hour scheme using a disk-shaped hour hand, in which names of chief cities in the world are displayed depending on a relative time difference therebetween (see FIG. 1). A clock according to the above present enables a user to grasp the present times of chief places in the world but has a slight difficulty in the user interface, unlike a conventional clock (having an hour hand and a minute hand). That is, a glance of the user is not enough to catch whether it is the time of earlier or later date and the disk-shaped plate having the names of the major cities serves as an hour hand. Disclosure of Invention The present invention provides a portable universal timepiece enabling a user to directly grasp local time of chief cities or regions in the world, an altitude of the sun, and whether a date is changed or not. The universal timepiece includes a circular base plate in which 24 division indexes are displayed with the same angle around a center of the timepiece, an hour hand rotated once for 24 hours, and a region plate where names of regions in the world or symbols of the names and a date boundary line are displayed at a relative position on a circumference of the timepiece. The base plate is divided into an upper half part and a lower half part by a color or a line. A symbol symbolizing noon is displayed on a top of the upper half part, and a symbol symbolizing afternoon and the international Date Line is displayed on a base of the lower half part. The region plate is formed at an inside or outside of the base plate with a concentric circle. The timepiece further includes a minute hand rotated once for an hour, and a second hand rotated once for a minute. Unlike a conventional clock, the base plate is fixed and has 24 indexes that are equivalently divided around a circumference of the universal timepiece. The hour hand is rotated once for a day (24 hours). Time is read by the same manner as a conventional manner. In this disclosure, the "12 o'clock direction" means a direction indicated at 12 o'clock by an hour hand of the conventional clock. Further, "upper half part", "lower half part", "top", "base", "over", "under", "inside", and "outside" indicate relative positions on a top plan view where the 12 o'clock direction is in an upper part, respectively. In the base plate, numbers "0-24" or "0-12" successive to "1-11" are displayed at an inside of an hour division mark having 12 indexes or between hour division marks. To distinguish between a.m. and p.m., colors of "0-12" and "1-1 1" may be different from each other. In case that the universal timepiece further includes the minute hand, 4 or 12 minute division indexes are preferably made at an inside of each hour division index so as to enhance readability of the minute. On the division mark, numbers "0, 15, 30, and 45" or "0, 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50" may be made to display a minute. The upper and lower half parts of the base plate are preferably divided by different colors or lines on the basis of a virtual line that passes an index corresponding to 6 a.m. and an index corresponding to 6 p.m., which enables a user to easily grasp whether a specific region is at day or night. The division boundary line corresponds to a macro-horizon of the timepiece-using region (hereinafter referred to as "the present region"), and an angle between the hour hand and the boundary line becomes an altitude of the sun. Therefore, by watching the timepiece, the user can grasp a position of the sun. Although a user is in a closed space (e.g., an office or basement of a large building, subway, submarine, etc.), the above function enables him/her to intuitively perceive a position of the sun or whether the sun rises or sets. Further, if the concept of a previously applied invention (PCT/KR99/00309 entitled "TIMEPIECE FROM WHICH SUNRISE AND SUNSET TIME CAN BE DETERMINED") is added to the present invention, the user can grasp sunrise and sunset time in specific month and region and a position of the sun at the present time. To enhance the readability, a symbol symbolizing noon is preferably marked on a top (i.e., an index corresponding to so-called "12 o'clock direction") of the upper half part and a symbol symbolizing p.m. and the International Date Line is preferably marked on a base of the lower half part. The region plate is a circular or donut-shaped plate. On the circumference of the region plate, names of chief regions in the world or symbols of the names and the International Date Lines are displayed at a relative position based upon a practical longitude of the Earth. With a concentric circle with the base plate, the region plate may be formed at an inside or outside of the base plate. If the region plate is formed at the inside thereof, the region plate is circular. On the other hand, if the region plate is formed at the outside thereof, the region plate is donut- shaped. The names may be selected according to frequently used regions or purposes. A minus (-) is preferably marked on the left of the International Date Line displayed on the base plate and on the right of the International Date Line displayed on the region plate, when viewed from the center of the universal timepiece. The universal timepiece is divided into two regions by a virtual line drawn by the International Date Line of the base plate and a timepiece central line and a virtual line drawn by the International Date Line of the region plate and the timepiece central line. On the region plate, a region corresponding to the minus (- ) marked region is correctly accorded with a west region whose present time is earlier than p.m., which enables the user to grasp an order of the date. The rotation direction of the hour and minute hands can be determined at random. If each of the plates is rotated counter-clockwise, numbers for indicating hour and minute are displayed clockwise. On the other hand, if each of the plate is rotated clockwise, the numbers for indicating hour and minute are displayed counter-clockwise. If the hour and minute hands are rotated clockwise, east- disposed names of the cities of the region plate are arranged counter-clockwise on the circumference. On the other hand, if the hour and minute hands are rotated counter-clockwise, the east-disposed names are arranged clockwise on the circumference. Although the region plate is fixed to set a specific city toward the 12 o'clock direction, it is preferably rotated by a user at random. The region plate is usually set to the 12 o'clock direction, but moves toward a direction indicated by the hour hand in order to grasp the present time of other region. In this case, a number displayed on the hour division index coming in touch with each name on the region plate and a number displayed on the minute division index indicated by the minute hand are hour and minute of the present time in the present region, respectively. More conveniently, together with the hour hand, the region plate is preferably rotated once for 24 hours with the same direction as that of the hour hand. With reference to this specification, a person skilled in the art may readily realize the universal timepiece according to the invention. That is, the universal timepiece may be realized by a mechanical method using a combination of sawteeth having a specific rotation rate with respect to a driving device, as well as by an electronic method or a display device such as a liquid crystal or a monitor. If the universal timepiece is realized in a computer screen by a software method, it will be very useful for a field of the international enterprise related with the time. Brief Description of Drawings FIG. 1 is a concept diagram of a universal timepiece according to a prior art. FIG. 2 through FIG. 4 are concept diagrams showing the steps of handling a timepiece, based upon local movement, according to the present invention. Best Mode for Carrying out the Invention A method of reading various information from a timepiece according to the present invention will now be described hereinafter with reference to accompanying drawings. In order to simplify description of the invention, assuming that a region plate is positioned at an exterior of a base plate and an hour hand is rotated clockwise. Therefore, the hour hand seems to be longer than a minute hand in the drawings. However, it will be understood that the minute hand may be longer than the hour hand by suitably adjusting construction units of the invention. Further, the region plate is rotated at random to set its position. Once the position of the region plate is set, the region plate is rotated to the same direction and with the same angular speed as the hour hand. A symbol symbolizing the sun is made at the end of the hour hand in order to emphasize a relationship between a horizontal and an altitude of the sun. A line is drawn between indexes 6 a.m. and 6 p.m., and a lower half part is hatched (here, the "hatched " means a lower part of the horizontal). Assuming that the present region is Seoul, the present time is 10: 10 a.m., and the date is 10th. Although only a few cities are drawn for simplicity of the drawings, the number of cities and names thereof are suitably selectable. After setting an hour hand and a minute hand (not shown) to 10: 10 a.m., a region plate is rotated to move an index of Seoul onto an extension line of the hour hand (see FIG. 2). Under this state, because the hour hand is rotated together with the region plate, the time indicated by the hour hand and the minute hand is the present time of a region indicated by the hour hand. Further, an hour division index of the base plate, corresponding to an index displayed on the region plate, displays o'clock of the present time of each city. At this time, the present time of Chicago is 7: 10 p.m. and Chicago is located in a minus (-) marked region out of regions divided by the International Date Line. Therefore, the present time of Chicago is 7: 10 p.m., 9th. By the same manner, the present time of London is 1 : 10 a.m., 10th. Thus, a user can directly grasp the present time of chief cities in the world without handlings. When the user moves to New York with a timepiece that was used in Seoul without setting, he/she can directly understand that local time of New York is 4:38 a.m. in the same day as that of Seoul. As a result, separate handlings are not needed. For visual convenience, an extension line of the hour hand and an index of New York are preferably converged to each other by setting the hour hand (see FIG. 4; a setting device is not shown therein). From the time that the handling is completed, the user can directly grasp the local time (of New York) by reference to the hour hand and the minute hand without being aware of the region plate. Further, the user can intuitively perceive that it is night and the sun will rise in about an hour 20 minutes. Industrial Usability According to the present invention, the universal timepiece enables a user to directly grasp the present time of chief cities in the world and understand a relationship between dates of a specific region and the present region. Further, the universal time piece enables the user to correctly perceive an altitude of the sun in each region of the world.

Claims: What is claimed is: 1. A universal timepiece including a circular base plate in which 24 division indexes are displayed with the same angle around a center of the timepiece and an hour hand rotated once for 24 hours, wherein the base plate is divided into an upper half part and a lower half part by a color or a line, and wherein a symbol symbolizing noon is displayed on a top of the upper half part and a symbol symbolizing afternoon and the international Date Line is displayed on a base of the lower half part, the universal timepiece comprising: a region plate where names of regions in the world or symbols of the names and a date boundary line are displayed at a relative position on a circumference of the timepiece, the region plate being formed at an inside or outside of the base plate with a concentric circle. 2. The universal timepiece of claim 1 , wherein a minus (-) is marked left and right of the International Date Line when viewed from the center of the clock. 3. The universal timepiece of claim 1 or claim 3, wherein the region plate is independently rotatable by handling of a user. 4. The universal timepiece of claim 1 or claim 2, wherein the region plate is rotated once for 24 hours to the same direction as a rotation direction of the hour hand. 5. The universal timepiece of claim 1 or claim 2, operating by a mechanical or electronic method of the hour hand and the region plate. 6. The universal timepiece of claim 1 or claim 2, being programmed to be operated and displayed on a computer.

Inventors: CHOI JANG-SUNG, EO YOON-HYOUNG, CHOI, JANG-SUNG, EO, YOON-HYOUNG
Applicants: CHOI JANG SUNG, EO YOON HYOUNG, TIMESPACE SYSTEM CO LTD, CHOI, JANG-SUNG, EO, YOON-HYOUNG, TIMESPACE SYSTEM CO., LTD
Application year: 2000
Main classification: G04B19
IPC codes: G04B19