Zenith Aircraft Carrier Clock - the Cairelli Roulette

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Since most of you were never in the Navy cross off the watch section idea there were 5 four hour watches and 2 two hour watches per day the 2 hour watches were called dog watches so the reason behind this watch's existence is that, in order for the crew to rotate through all the watches, it was necessary to split one of the watches in half, to create an odd number of watches in a ship's day. This allowed the sailors to stand different watches instead of one team being forced to stand the mid-watch every night. The choice of time also allows both watches, if there are only two, to eat an evening meal at about the traditional time. I am sold on it being a sort of sector clock for tracking aircraft.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchstanding
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If it is a sector clock, like the British examples, why make the coloured chips removeable?
It would have been cheaper & more reliable to have a simple bezel with painted sectors.
 
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If it is a sector clock, like the British examples, why make the coloured chips removeable?
It would have been cheaper & more reliable to have a simple bezel with painted sectors.
If you ever looked at naval deck clocks of the allies and axis powers of WW2 the Axis spared no expense on there Deck clocks so money was no object it seems. I got a German U-boat clock in the collection and it puts the Chelsea and Seth Thomas US Deck clocks to shame in quality. Dam the Italian Navy divers used Panerai dive watches in WW2 think they worried about money. The axis all ways over engineered there equipment and allies thought different simple was better so we can out produce the axis powers in equipment and why most likely it gave us the edge and won WW2.
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Since most of you were never in the Navy cross off the watch section idea there were 5 four hour watches and 2 two hour watches per day the 2 hour watches were called dog watches so the reason behind this watch's existence is that, in order for the crew to rotate through all the watches, it was necessary to split one of the watches in half, to create an odd number of watches in a ship's day. This allowed the sailors to stand different watches instead of one team being forced to stand the mid-watch every night. The choice of time also allows both watches, if there are only two, to eat an evening meal at about the traditional time. I am sold on it being a sort of sector clock for tracking aircraft.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchstanding


They don't have dog watches?

I agree, have stood many dogs as a younger man. And the command crew and us never needed to look at a clock to know when we were supposed to be on watch.

I also agree on the aircraft tracking, but I'm still inclined to CAP (Combat Air Patrol) tracking/scheduling until a better option comes up.

We need to find the 80 year old Regia Marina equivalent to the modern aircraft carrier "Air Boss" and then we will have the answer.
 
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My reasoning.

The duty CAP squadron (or the ONLY fighter squadron in those days) would assign 6 pairs of birds to do CAP.
They would be identified by their colour (Red One/Red Two) and slotted into a two hour bracket as shown by the chips.

The chips could be rotated depending on crew/aircraft availability and gave crews a chance to time sleep/meals etc.

Maybe if one "Red bird" crapped itself, it could be quickly replaced by the next bird on Fly One so they could show a CAP that had two different birds.

Just my thoughts.
 
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Since most of you were never in the Navy cross off the watch section idea there were 5 four hour watches and 2 two hour watches per day the 2 hour watches were called dog watches...

Is it true that the 2-hour watches were called "dog watches" because they were cur-tailed?

Anybody else love Patrick O'Brian?

Thanks for the sector clock info, by the way. It makes a lot of sense.
 
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Great contributions - thanks everybody. Let me throw a wrinkle into the proceedings. The color complement of chips seems to vary from example to example. Sometimes there are more than two chips of the same color. Sometimes all 12 chips are divided into two colors. In the example in Roessler, all 12 of the chips are white. I have no idea what is original.
 
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Is it true that the 2-hour watches were called "dog watches" because they were cur-tailed?

Anybody else love Patrick O'Brian?

Thanks for the sector clock info, by the way. It makes a lot of sense.
Dog watches being cur-tailed made it so when you stood watch the next day was not at the same time if they did 6 four hour watches you would be doing the same watch every day. So it helped rotate watches to have the dog watches it would suck to have the mid watch every day that one starts at midnight and get off watch at 0400 then start work at 0700 you would be a zombie if you did the midwatch every day with lack of sleep.
 
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If you ever looked at naval deck clocks of the allies and axis powers of WW2 the Axis spared no expense on there Deck clocks so money was no object it seems. I got a German U-boat clock in the collection and it puts the Chelsea and Seth Thomas US Deck clocks to shame in quality. Dam the Italian Navy divers used Panerai dive watches in WW2 think they worried about money. The axis all ways over engineered there equipment and allies thought different simple was better so we can out produce the axis powers in equipment and why most likely it gave us the edge and won WW2.

Any chance of seeing the U-boat clock. Years ago I had a really nice Heuer U-boat stopwatch
 
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Any chance of seeing the U-boat clock. Years ago I had a really nice Heuer U-boat stopwatch
Generally they are Junghans. Hard to post them here as they tend to have a certain symbol on them that’s bad form to post here.
 
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Great contributions - thanks everybody. Let me throw a wrinkle into the proceedings. The color complement of chips seems to vary from example to example. Sometimes there are more than two chips of the same color. Sometimes all 12 chips are divided into two colors. In the example in Roessler, all 12 of the chips are white. I have no idea what is original.

What else are you holding back? 😒

Not that it will help me. I still have no clue, and still want one.
 
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Generally they are Junghans. Hard to post them here as they tend to have a certain symbol on them that’s bad form to post here.
Mine made by Kieninger & Obergfell the Junghans ones were more cheaply made and were made later in the war. The Kieninger & Obergfell ones had a all brass case made around 1939 with a 8 day movement on the dial it has that emblem on the left side on the right a serial number and a N for north sea fleet when I look at the clock I think of that movie Dos Boat. I will post it if it won't piss no body off. Also have a WW2 Japanese Navy Deck clock made by Seikosha the forerunner of Seiko one of these days would like to get a British Navy deck clock then I will have one from all the major combatants of WW2.
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Go ahead & post, I say. Censorship helps people forget, & we shouldn't forget that. Lest it happen again.
 
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I got a better idea I posted over at the MWR forum when I got it a few years ago you want to it see click the link you don't because of the emblem don't hit the link that way every body is happy.
http://www.mwrforum.net/forums/showthread.php?68982-WW2-German-U-Boat-Clock&highlight=U-boat

That’s really cool.
Is it true that the 2-hour watches were called "dog watches" because they were cur-tailed?

Anybody else love Patrick O'Brian?

Thanks for the sector clock info, by the way. It makes a lot of sense.
Generally they are Junghans. Hard to post them here as they tend to have a certain symbol on them that’s bad form to post here.

Mine came from a vet. Nothing on the face but the caseback had the engraving
 
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I agree, have stood many dogs as a younger man. And the command crew and us never needed to look at a clock to know when we were supposed to be on watch.

Yes! Just a few things you needed to do to stay out of trouble... one is not missing a watch.



 
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I see what you did there 😁.

And in my day, late on watch usually got you a promotion, Captain of the Heads!
 
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I see what you did there 😁.

And in my day, late on watch usually got you a promotion, Captain of the Heads!
Being Boatswain mate of the watch on the bridge were I passed the words over the 1MC and was in charge of the watch section of about 8 crewman and followed the officer of the deck orders on the bridge one of the guys in my section was late relieving the watch on the midwatch. Had to give him on the job training why he should be on time well when we got relieved at 0400 in the morning after a 4 hour watch and we went to get a little sleep he stayed for another hour with the watch section that relieved us to see how it felt not to get relieved on time and at night it hurts at sea getting enough sleep is rare. He never did it again he was on time after that.
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