American Time Blog

There are many societal norms we can rebel against if we want. Not hungry in the morning? You can skip breakfast. Tired of the 9 to 5? You can buy a Volkswagen van and tour the country until you run out of money.

Usually, if something doesn't feel right, you can just opt out, practical repercussions aside. But there is one imperial force against which individual rebellion is futile: Daylight Savings Time begins November 3rd.

Not every region follows the practice, but if you happen to find yourself in the vast majority of the U.S. where clocks are set forward an hour in the spring and back again in the fall, this is one instance where you'll make it easier on yourself by going with the flow.

If the march of time means progress, then it is only fitting that the devices that track  time are also subject to innovations along the way.

In a world that becomes more connected every day, so are the synchronized clock systems that coordinate our lives. At the heart of such a system is the master system controller, also known as the master clock. This device ties together all the clocks throughout a facility.

The master clock sends the time signal to the secondary clocks, making sure they all tick as one, but newer versions synchronize time in truer fashion and are easier to use.

Here, we'll explain how the latest master controllers differ from the models of yesteryear.

For some purchases, the quantity you need is easy to determine. Car tires or shoes? Piece of cake. But other consumer decisions require a little more thought when you're figuring out how much to buy.

If you're outfitting your manufacturing facility with a synchronized clock system, determining just how many units you need isn't a straightforward proposition. The answer depends not only on the size of your space but its layout and purpose.

Here are some ways to gauge how many clocks you need in your facility, where to place them, and which types of devices are the best fit.

It's back! American Time is excited to announce the 2nd annual Maintenance Hero Contest. This contest is open to any organization - private, public, nonprofit, educational or others - that wishes to nominate their invaluable maintenance professional.

At American Time, we take recognition seriously. And recognizing Maintenance Heroes is a passion of ours because they keep businesses humming in just about every industry imaginable. You know who they are, our ghostbusters, our supermen and superwomen, there to save the day when something is (quite literally) falling apart. Unfortunately, often times their heroism is behind the scenes and goes unnoticed. Maintenance professionals and are an integral part of any successful business and juggle a wide variety of skills to make sure everyone can keep moving.

George Wilkes, president of American Time says, "We're happy to to continue the contest and spotlight more Maintenance Heroes who are making a difference in their workplace." Take this chance to nominate your maintenance superhero and give them the recognition they deserve!

Master clocks have been keeping time synchronized in schools, hospitals, factories and offices for a long, long time. Like the conductor of an Orchestra keeping musicians moving to the same beat, the master clock keeps everyone moving at the right pace, by ensuring that every clock in its system is showing the same time.

Technology is like sand on the beach. It has a way of getting everywhere.

There was a time when a phone was just a phone and a TV was just a TV, but technological advances have ways of seeping into the everyday objects around us. We have smartphones, smart TVs, even smart toasters. This also extends to clocks.

Advances in timekeeping have made it easier for people to manage and tell time, but some digital clocks are now portals to the outside world.

Here are some functions beyond the basics of timekeeping that can be integrated into a synchronized digital clock system:

For anyone who takes direction from someone else — so, virtually all of us — it can be comforting to realize that your boss has a boss.

You might be told what to do every day and work under intense scrutiny, but the person scrutinizing you is also under pressure. See? Your boss is human, too.

But not all authority figures are human. Take, for instance, the clock on the wall. In a time-sensitive scenario, the clock is your boss, and if it's part of a synchronized system, the time it displays supersedes all other competing sources, such as phones or computers.

When you think of choreography, you probably picture your favorite music video or your kid's dance recital, or anything with a lot of synchronized twists, steps, and spins.

But there are a lot of things that have to be choreographed, such as a typical day on a college campus. It can be a beautiful thing to watch the teeming masses scurry across a stately campus in the pursuit of knowledge, and like any graceful production, it requires an eye for detail.

When you think about the clock system that ties your campus schedule together, one detail you must consider is which type of clock you should install. Also, it's important to know that in the world of synchronized clocks, Wi-Fi and wireless mean two different things. Let's explore which type of clock works best for you, depending on the size of your campus.

Have you ever taken on a major project in your home and wished you could just start from scratch and rebuild the house from the ground up?

Remember in “Back to the Future” when they're in the mall parking lot and Doc is testing his DeLorean? As the contraption speeds up to 88 miles per hour before disappearing into the void, Doc isn't just ripping a hole in space and time, but demonstrating the value of an accurate digital display.

As Doc operates the vehicle with his remote control — with Marty watching wide-eyed and poor Einstein the dog sitting in driver's seat — the rising tension centers on the controller's LED readout as the DeLorean's speed creeps up toward that transcendent threshold.

There's a reason Doc didn't rely on an analog display as the exotic sports car hurdles toward him and young Marty. In the process of making the most important scientific breakthrough in the history of human civilization, Doc knows the value of precision.