‘Design-Society’ Cycle: A Case Study on the Story of Longitude - Principia Designae: Pre-Design, Design, and Post-Design - page 122

Great Britain for the safety of the Navy and Merchant Ships as well as for the
improvement of Trade that for want thereof many Ships have been retarded in their
voyages, and many lost ... ” [and there will be a Longitude Prize] “ ... for such
person or persons as shall discover the Longitude.”
The prizes were planned to be awarded for the demonstration of a practical
method for determining the longitude of a ship at sea, in various amounts for
solutions of various accuracy. These prizes, worth millions of dollars in today's
currency, motivated many to search for a solution ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
History_of_longitude ) .
Besides Britain, France, Holland, and Spain were also interested in solving this
problem. France's King Louis XIV founded Acad´mie Royale des Sciences in
1666, with an aim, among others, advancement of the science of navigation and
the improvement of maps and sailing charts. From 1715, the Acad´mie offered a
prize specifically for navigation (Taylor 1971 ). Spain's Philip II offered a prize for
the discovery of a solution to the problem in 1567; Philip III increased the amount
of the prize in 1598. Holland offered a similar prize in 1636 ( http://www-groups.
dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/PrintHT/Longitude1.html ) . Navigators and scientists in
most European countries were aware of the problem and tried to find a solution,
making it one of the largest scientific endeavours in history.
Astronomers, however, believed that the solution lied in mapping objects in the
sky. The first publication of a method for determining time by observing the
position of the Earth's moon was in 1514 by Johannes Werner ( http://en.
wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_longitude ) ; other proposals followed from Galileo,
Hally, Maskelyne, etc., although with little success as the proposals were unreliable
due to errors introduced by the sea or variability in the phenomena used.
Harrison, however, looked for a mechanical answer to meet the strict criteria of
keeping a ship within half a degree of longitude on a voyage from England to the
West Indies. For this, a clock had to maintain an accuracy of 2.8 s a day, a huge
challenge against temperature changes and a ship's motion.
The concept of using a clock was probably introduced in 1553 by Gemma Frisius
( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemma_Frisius ) . Pendulum clocks had been used on
land with success; Huygens had developed accurate pendulum clocks that were
used to determine longitude on land. He also proposed the use of a balance spring to
regulate clocks. Many, including Isaac Newton, however, thought it impossible to
develop a clock of the required accuracy.
Harrison began working on a land clock that was more accurate than any of the
time. He revolutionized one aspect of the clock by eliminating the need for
lubricating oil that often contributed to clock-failure. Oils dried out in summer
and became thick in winter. Working with his younger brother James, in 1720 he
designed and built a clock-tower for the family-estate of Sir Charles Pelham. With
this clock, he made further design changes that enhanced the stability of the clock.
They designed a series of high-precision clocks that included innovations such as a
pendulum rod made of alternate wires of brass and steel, eliminating the problem of
a pendulum's effective length varying with changes in temperature.