There was a really interesting park where the Clam River Greenway began (Sunday hikes). One of the features was this human sundial.
The posts have numbers on them.
There is a grid in the middle with the months on it. You stand along the centerline of the grid on the correct portion of the month and your shadow will be cast to the correct time.
Of course, it was overcast when I wanted to take pictures. However, I had tried it earlier. Now here's the goofy thing. It was 3:22 clock time, and the sundial said about 3:30. Sounds good, right? Nope. With Daylight Savings Time, the sundial should have said about 2:30. So... did the makers of the grid build that adjustment into it, knowing kids would be using it, and not wanting to confuse them or need to explain?
At any rate, it's very cool. It would be a neat camp science project to build a temporary one.
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That is really cool though I have never seen a sundial calibrated to DST. Wish my clocks weren't calibrated to it.
ReplyDeleteOh, oh! Here's how you can check to see if they built in an "adjustment." Go back at Christmas time and see what sort of result you get.
ReplyDeleteThat is very clever. Refer to the analemma for corrections to solar time and to convert to standard time.
ReplyDeleteThat is very cool. I've never seen anything like that.
ReplyDeleteCool! Isn't DST a relatively new concept? I'm thinking sundials weren't used with that in mind.
ReplyDelete