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The Armillary

Two interests dating back to my elementary school days are Astronomy and Archaeology. Combining these two had me build an Armillary. It's easier to show a picture rather than describe it.

This ancient astronomical device was developed in ancient Greece and China. This one I made from embroidery hoops and when oriented properly tells the time of day. The smaller hoop is designed to track the sun on it's journey from the Tropic of Cancer to the Tropic of Capricorn. It was only after I had glued everything together that I realized that I put the 'ecliptic' at 23 ° from the North/South Poles rather than from the Equator. I have an idea how to build another one (correctly this time) that should be a little more user friendly.
After making this, I realized that these hoops could be used for some of my 'percussion repair'. If it works,I'll post it in the future.

In the meantime, I have some private students who would probably like to make their own armillary for a Science Fair project.




















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