编者的话：6月8日，英国全国性综合日报《卫报》在第20版“国际”版发表Tania Branigan在北京的报道《中国城市拥有世界最大机械钟 英国一公司制造了展现赣州发展的大钟》。现将全文编译转发，敬请关注。
中国城市拥有世界最大机械钟
英国一公司制造了展现赣州发展的大钟
这是一名设计者为赣州和谐钟塔公园绘制的效果图。这个公园的亮点将是一座由德比史密斯公司打造的安装在113米高钟塔上的大钟。（图片由德比史密斯公司提供）
它结合了150年之久的尖端专业技术经验，使著名的大本钟也显得小了。
看起来似乎不太可能，但事实是，本周开始，工人们已经在赣州这个中国东南部的城市，安装这座世界上最大的机械钟。
钟面直径达13米，几乎是英国议会大厦大本钟的两倍大小；分针长度为7.8米。
这可能是中国雄心壮志的一个典型例子，而时钟则是由来自英国的家族企业德比史密斯制作的。1846年成立以来，该公司还为圣潘克拉斯火车站和圣保罗大教堂制作过时钟。
该公司说，虽然他们仍在不断翻新和维修时钟，但最近一次制造大型机械钟却是在20世纪50年代， 因为近年来大部分人都选择了更便宜、更轻便的电子钟。
100万英镑的项目，不仅需要通过时间积累的经验，更需要新技术。“当时钟超出了一定的规格时，其复杂和困难程度要远远难于时钟大小的比例，” 伦敦国家海事博物馆钟表资深专家乔纳森·贝茨说，“它要比看起来重很多，因为时钟的质量实在太大了。”
传统的钢铁指针每根重约2吨。然而，史密斯，一个来自德比（英国中部城市），创造了F1赛车碳纤维面板的公司，转向了EPM技术。公司利用其掌握的专业知识使指针仅有65至70公斤重（约150磅）。四个巨大的钟面是由一家有着95年历史的中国公司生产的。
德比史密斯公司总经理鲍勃·贝茨说：“最大的挑战是它的安全性（因为它太大了）。”他提到1976年的大本钟机械装置爆炸事件。“另一个特别之处是，它很精致。由于要公开展示，它必须有漂亮的外观。”
钟塔包括一个观景台，游客可以清晰地看到它的运转情况。钟塔由硬化钢和镀金青铜部件组成。在同类钟表中，这座时钟是世界上最大的，无论是从指针、表盘的尺寸，还是从花费的时间来看。它需要足足一年时间来设计制造。
尽管重达10吨，时钟还是如期抵达中国。目前，史密斯公司的员工已前往赣州，将它安装到113米高的和谐钟塔上。和谐钟塔位于一个新的集商业、居住、主题公园为一体的核心发展区域。
时钟将在本月底亮相，整个钟塔将于明年向公众开放。时钟的精确度将控制在每月误差30秒之内，并采用全球定位系统技术进行自我纠正。保质期是100年，但该公司称它可以持续工作更长的时间。
“100年前中国就有我们的产品。”贝茨说，“我们很高兴能在100年后还能看到它们在运转。”上海外滩海关大楼的时钟是由巴顿乔伊斯公司制作的，现在该公司已经成为史密斯集团的一部分。贝茨说，很多钟表都在上个世纪的动荡中被损毁，但一些城市还是想重新安装机械钟表。
“技术含量低不一定是坏事，尤其是如果你想让它长时间运转。如果你不想将时间精确到千分之一秒, 机械钟表便是一个非常好的选择，它们能运转数百年。”乔纳森·贝茨说。
认为，人们还会被机械钟表蕴含的艺术魅力所吸引。“至少，人们也会被这些完全人为而又有着自己生命力的杰作所吸引。”
开发和谐钟塔公园的赣州高速公路公司的一位发言人说，根据专家的意见，选择机械钟是因为它能给人以历史感，所以他们将目光转向英国。该公司希望这个机械钟不仅要技术精密，同时还要实用。该发言人说：“它将不只是记录时间，而且还会提醒人们不要浪费时间”。（彭璐、曾晶 译）
附：英文全文
Chinese city gets world's largest mechanical clock
British firm constructs giant timepiece for Ganzhou development
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Tania Branigan in Beijing
guardian.co.uk, Monday 7 June 2010 21.00 BST
Article history
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An artist’s impression of Ganzhou’s Harmony park which will feature the 113-metre high clock built by Smith of Derby. Photograph: Smith of Derby
It combines 150 years of expertise with cutting-edge racing car technology and makes Big Ben's clock look diminutive.
Workers are this week beginning to install the world's largest mechanical clock in the unlikely surroundings of Ganzhou, a city in southeast China.
The faces are 13 metres in diameter – almost twice the size of those on the Houses of Parliament tower – while the minute hand is 7.8 metres long.
It may be a classic example of China's ambition, but the clock was made in England by the family firm Smith of Derby. Founded in 1846, the company also has timepieces in St Pancras station and St Paul's Cathedral.
The firm said the last time it built a large mechanical clock from scratch was in the 1950s, although it has continued to refurbish and repair them. In recent years most people have opted for cheaper, lighter electric versions.
The £1m project has required new technology as well as historical expertise. "When you get beyond a certain scale, the complexity and difficulty becomes magnified beyond the degree to which [a clock] is larger," said Jonathan Betts, senior specialist in horology at the National Maritime Museum in London. "It becomes much heavier than the size would suggest, because there is so much more mass to it."
Traditional steel hands would have weighed around 2 tonnes each. Instead, Smith turned to EPM Technology, a Derby firm that creates carbon fibre panels for F1 cars. It used its expertise to make hands weighing a mere 65 to 70kg (about 150lb). The four giant clock faces were produced by Yantai, a 95-year-old Chinese firm.
"The greatest challenge was to make it safe [given its size]," said Bob Betts, managing director of Smith of Derby. He pointed to the 1976 incident in which Big Ben's clock mechanism exploded.
"The [other] unusual thing is that it's exquisite – it has to look lovely because it's on public display."
The tower includes a viewing gallery so visitors can inspect the movement, which is made from hardened steel with bronze finishing and brass and gold-plated components. The clock is the largest of its kind in the world when measured by size of dial and hands and has taken a year to design and build.
Despite weighing 10 tonnes it was flown to China to meet the customer's deadline. Staff from Smith have travelled to Ganzhou to install it in the 113 metre high Harmony tower, at the heart of a new development described as part business, part residential and part horologically themed park.
The clock will be unveiled at the end of the month and the tower opened to the public next year. The timepiece is accurate to within 30 seconds a month and uses GPS technology to correct itself. It comes with a 100-year guarantee, though the company says it should last much longer.
"We were doing pieces in China 100 years ago," said Betts. "It's a delightful position to be working with them 100 years later and still looking after all these pieces." The clock on the customs house on Shanghai's Bund was made by JB Joyce and Co, now part of the group. Other timepieces were destroyed in the turmoil of the last century, but Betts said several cities were interested in reinstalling them.
"Low technology is not always bad, especially if you want it to last for a very long time," said Jonathan Betts, who is not related to the Smith of Derby boss. "As long as you don't want something that gives you the time to within 1/1,000th of a second, mechanical clocks are a very good option. They have centuries of working life in them."
He added that people also found the artistry behind them compelling. "Even on the most basic level they capture people's interest: to see these entirely man-made objects with lives of their own," he said.
A spokesman for the Ganzhou Expressway Company, which is developing Harmony park, said it chose a mechanical clock because it wanted a historical feel and turned to the UK on the advice of experts. The firm hopes the tower will be morally improving as well as useful.
"Not only will it record the time, but it will also remind people not to waste time," said the spokesman.
（原文网址：http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/07/chinese-city-worlds-largest-mechanical-clock）
（来源：中国新闻网） |
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