Sestrel Red and Blue segment ships Radio Room clock, circa 1960

For sale this fine and uncommon Ships Radio Room Clock with rare Red & Blue segments, by Sestrel, dating circa 1960. This version has a mechanical movement supplied by FW Elliott and fully signed. F W Elliott is a noted supplier to all areas of the UK Military and Merchant Marine. Most examples with the mechanical movement feature either just Red Segment or Red and Green Segments. This one on offer must have been produced just on the cusp of the transition to battery powered mechanisms. The clock has just been fully serviced keeping good time, running for around 8days. Dial diameter is 6inches with a hight including the wooden backing pate of approx. 4.25inches, the wooden back mounting plated is 11inches diameter. A rare example. Price £695.000 inclusive of shipping to within the UKAll stations using 2182kHz were required to maintain a strictly enforced three-minute silence and listening period twice each hour, starting at h+00, h+30. This allowed any station with distress, urgent or safety traffic the best chance of being heard at that time, even if they were at some distance from other stations, operating on reduced battery power or perhaps reduced antenna efficiency, as for example from a dismasted vessel. As a visual aide-memoire, a typical clock in a ship's radio room would have these silence periods marked by shading the sectors from h+00 to h+03 and from h+30 to h+33 in green. Similar sectors were marked in red for what used to be the corresponding silence and listening period on 500 kHz between h+15 and h+18 and from h+45 to h+48. These silence periods are no longer required as the introduction of GMDSS has produced alternative automatic watchkeeping systems and the 500kHz band is no longer in use for maritime traffic.