Forks have traditionally been used to tune musical instruments, although electronic tuners are replacing them in many applications. Tuning forks can be driven electrically, by placing electromagnets close to the prongs that are attached to an electronic oscillator circuit, so that their sound does not die out.
A number of keyboard musical instruments using constructions similar to tuning forks have been made, the most popular of them being the Rhodes piano, which has hammers hitting constructions working on the same principle as tuning forks.
The Accutron, an electromechanical watch developed by Max Hetzel and manufactured by Bulova beginning in 1960, used a 360-hertz steel tuning fork powered by a battery as its timekeeping element. The fork allowed it to achieve greater accuracy than conventional balance-wheel watches. The humming sound of the tuning fork could be heard when the watch was held to the ear.
Tuning forks, usually C-512, are used by doctors to check a patient's hearing. Lower-pitched ones (usually C-128) are also used to check vibration sense as part of the examination of the peripheral nervous system.
Tuning forks are also used in alternative medicine, such as sonopuncture and polarity therapy.
Medical Tuning Fork 128 Hz
A radar gun, used to measure the speed of cars or balls in sports, is usually calibrated with tuning forks.
Instead of the frequency, these forks are labeled with the calibration speed and radar band (e.g. X-Band or K-Band) for which they are calibrated.
Doubled and H-type of tuning forks are used for tactical-grade Vibrating Structure Gyroscopes, like QuapasonTM and different types of MEMS.
St Neot (Cornwall)
St Neot is a parish and village in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is between the towns of Bodmin and Liskeard. The parish is named after the Saxon monk, Saint Neot (who also gives his name to St Neots in Cambridgeshire). On the northern side the parish includes part of Bodmin Moor and hamlets in the parish include Draynes, Ley and Pantersbridge.
During the English Civil War St Neot was staunchly Royalist. To commemorate this, each year on Oak Apple Day (29 May), an oak branch is mounted on the top of the church tower.
The early medieval church building must have been smaller than the one in existence today and the church was rebuilt in granite in the 15th century. The fine stained glass windows are from about 1500.
The stained glass is partly original and partly from a restoration done by John Hedgeland, ca. 1830.
Lombe's Mill
Lombe's Mill was the first successful silk throwing mill in England. It was built in an island on the River Derwent in Derby. John Lombe visited Piedmont in 1717 and studied details of the Italian silk throwing machines- the "filatoio", and the "torcitoio". Then, he returned to England with some Italian craftsmen, and built the mill. George Sorocold designed the building.
Lombe's Mill was built next to Thomas Cotchett's 1704 mill on the west bank of the River Derwent in Derby. At this point a weir had been constructed across the river and the mill was built on an island downstream, which separated the river from the tail race of three corn mills. Derby was an important place, because the river had a fast flow and A6 road (from London to Carlisle) crossed the river here.
This mill is significant as it was the first successful silk throwing mill in England, and probably the first fully mechanized factory in the world.
Thomas Cotchett built the first mill in Derby in 1704, but it was unsuccessful. So John Lombe visited Piedmont in 1716 to see the successful silk throwing mill there. This was an early example of industrial spying. He returned to Derby with the knowledge and a group of Italians. He and his half brother Thomas Lombe (born 1685) instructed George Sorocold to build a mill to his design and fitted it with the new machines. It was built to the south of Cotchetts Mill. Thomas Lombe was given a 14 year patent to protect the design of the throwing machines he used. This displeased the King of Sardinia, and he stopped exporting suitable raw silk. It is speculated that he was responsible for John Lombes mysterious death six years later in 1722. His elder brother, Thomas Lombe took over the business. When the patents lost effect in 1732, other mills were built in Stockport and Macclesfield. To the north of the powered Italian Works an unpowered Doubling Shop was built- this happened before 1739. The mill was sold in 1739 to Thomas Wilson, and an inventory of this time is still exists.
Most of the building was rebuilt in after years, and little of the original mill remain. It is known from written sources that it was five storeys high rectangular in plan. It was 17m high, 33.5m long, and 12m wide. The roof was slightly sloped. It was built of brick in Flemish bond, on a series of stone arches that allowed the waters of the River Derwent to flow through. The throwing machines were two storeys high, and fastened on the first floor. The winding machines were placed on the top three floors. All the machines were powered by Sorocolds external undershot water wheel. It was 7m in diameter and 2m in width. Its stem entered the mill through a hole at first floor level. It drove a vertical shaft which was 0.45m square. This drove a line shaft (horizontal shaft or lay shaft) that ran the length of the mill. The "torcitoios" and "filatoios" took their power from this shaft. The vertical shaft was extended to a further vertical shaft that reached the top 3 floors to drive the winding machines. The mill needed to be heated in order to process the silk and this was explained in the 1718 patent. It was reported in 1732 that Lombe used a fire engine (steam engine) to pump hot air round the mill. The stair column was 19.5m high, but its layout is unknown. There is no information on how materials were carried up and down between the floors.
The main range was three storeys high, 42.4m by 5.5m. Each floor was used for doubling- and there were 306 doubling machines.
In 1700, the Italians were the most technologically advanced in silk throwing in Europe, and they had developed two machines capable of winding the silk onto bobbins while putting a twist in the thread. They called the throwing machine, a "filatoio", and the doubler, a "torcitoio". There is an illustration (drawn in 1487) of a circular handpowered throwing machine with 32 spindles. The first evidence of a externally powered filatoio comes from the thirteenth century, and the earliest illustration from around 1500. Filatorios and torcitoios contained parallel circular frames that revolved round each other on a central axis. The speed of the relative rotation determined the twist. Silk would only cooperate in the process if the temperature and humidity were high, in Italy the temperature was elevated by sunlight but in Derby the mill had to be heated, and the heat evenly distributed.
The mill then passed through several hands and has been rebuilt several times, but the modified structure still exists and has been restored to house the Derby Industrial Museum. A Bas relief sculpture of John Lombe may be found at the nearby Exeter Bridge.
The Lizard
The Lizard is a peninsula in south Cornwall, United Kingdom. The most southerly point of the British mainland is near Lizard Point at . Lizard village, the most southerly village on the British mainland, is in Landewednack, the most southerly parish.
The peninsula measures approximately x . It is southwest of Falmouth ten miles (16 km) east of Penzance.
The name "Lizard" is most probably a corruption of the Cornish name "Lys Ardh", meaning "high court". The name is not connected to the rock called serpentinite which is found here.
The Lizard's coast is particularly hazardous to shipping and the seaways round the peninsula were historically known as the "Graveyard of Ships". The Lizard Lighthouse was built at Lizard Point in 1752 and the RNLI operates The Lizard lifeboat station.