[time-nuts] Re: What everyday uses are there for accurate clocks?

[Oz-in-DFW]

On 11/28/2022 8:45 PM, Dr. David Kirkby via time-nuts wrote:
> I mentioned to someone the other day that I owned an HP GPS time and
> frequency standard. He asked me a simple question, but one I didn’t know
> the answer to.
>
>
> Apart from GPS, what in the daily lives of the general public need the sort
> of accuracy one can get from time-nut grade clocks? I believe some
> financial transactions is one application, and the cellular phone system
> another. Are there others?
Aside from Communication and astronomy, accurate time is a fundamental 
measure used in the establishment of many other dimensions. Current and 
Length are both defined with time as component.  Improved accuracy of 
time improves the accuracy of those other measures.  I believe the only 
measure that uses a physical item as it's reference is mass in the form 
of /*the */kilogram, and there is a lot of work going into eliminating 
that need.

As for things that need accurate clock, the question becomes how accurate?

If we use "better than NTP" as a reference there are a host of 
industrial applications that synchronize machinery.  High speed roll  
fed multistage printing presses need to have the stages synchronized to 
prevent from piling paper up, or shredding it.  Any similar process flow 
of continuous material needs PTP level synch - so wire drawing, metal 
sheet mills, paper mills, and so on.  Older versions of these used 
timing shafts which limited ramp rates and had propagation problems 
related to shaft flexure that limited the size of systems. Application 
of mechanical buffers was used to some degree, but they have their own 
problems.

Traffic flow management like trains and highways require far higher 
accuracy than I expected. It's required to maintain safety at high flow 
rates and optimize capacity. The incremental cost of rail capacity is 
not small. I expected the need to be ~10 sec accuracy and its often more 
like 10 milliseconds for high volume passenger rail and highways.

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