The Relógios & Relógios team interviewed independent watchmaker Miki Eleta, a member of the AHCI (Academy of Independent Creators in Watchmaking).
Directly from his workshop in Zurich, Switzerland, Miki Eleta spoke via Zoom about his incredible trajectory - he has no formal education in watchmaking - and announced first hand the launch of yet another of his fantastic creations, which we present below.
The interview had the collaboration of Kurt Kupper, friend of Miki Eleta, and Carlos E. Tiburcio Ramos, partner and collaborator of Watches & Watches.
Miki Eleta Svemir
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Miki Eleta's latest work of astronomical watchmaking art, Svemir (Universo), combines for the first time two astronomical models in one clock, geocentrism and heliocentrism.
Geocentrism places the Earth in the center, orbited by the sun, the moon and the other planets. During the 16th century, the Copernican Revolution replaced this concept with heliocentrism, in which all the planets and their moons revolve around the sun.
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Inspired by the construction of an armillary sphere, the geocentric model in "Svemir" consists of a globe surrounded by rings. In a cage of meridians, the Earth rotates on its axis in 24 hours.
The terrestrial equator is on the same level as the skeletonized static disk, with a division into 24 parts. Positioned as the celestial equator, it shows the time and the world time, as the division is concentric to the Earth's meridians.
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The ecliptic ring represents the path taken by the Sun in the geocentric model as it appears from Earth. The seasons, the months, the signs of the zodiac with their start and end dates, the highest and lowest positions of the sun, as well as the equinoxes, can be read on its 12 segments.
The Sun is represented as a white ball that moves under the current date at 1/365 per day along the ring of the ecliptic. The moon moves by jumping one division every day. It shows the moonphase, solar eclipses and tides (correction every 128 years).
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The heliocentric model located diagonally above the globe consists of its own sun and six planets.
All six planets are mounted on a common axis tilted 23.5 degrees from the Earth's axis. They revolve around the fixed sun visible below.
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According to Kepler's laws, the sun is slightly offset from the axis of the planets. The model displays the orbits of Mercury (period of revolution of 88 days), Venus (225 days), Earth (365 days), Mars (687 days = 1.8 years), Jupiter (4,329 days = 11.86 years) and Saturn (10,751 days = 29.45 years).
The clock mechanism has an hour and minute indication and provides power for all of the above functions.
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A manual demonstration of planetary motion in the heliocentric model is possible using a separate crank. The mechanism has a memory function, which can be used to move the model back to the correct position after a manual demonstration.
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To learn more about Miki Eleta and another fantastic creation, we recommend reading the article below:
Features
Construction time: about one year
Total height: 1,850 mm
Wooden base (walnut), with height of 1,250 mm
Width: 250 mm, diameter: 250 mm, foot: 330 x 330 mm
Movement
Huygens endless-rope winding-mechanism (winding without interruption of the clock)
6-day power reserve
Swiss anchor escape - 1.73 second oscillation duration
Indications
Hours, minutes, world time, month, season, zodiac signs with start and end date, equinoxes, solstices, moon phases, solar eclipses, tides, geocentric model, heliocentric model
