Timer switches: literally just a clock and a switch 

Worthy of note: the motor-driven timers consume 3W constantly - and with modern LED lighting, that means that depending on what you want the timer to do... it may not save any energy! If you use it to control a lamp with a single 5W bulb for 8 hours day, then it saves 80 watt-hours while also consuming 72 watt-hours. In that specific case, you might as well just leave the light on all day and forget having a timer!

It's a testament to your video making prowess and progress that such a polished and entertaining video is deemed a "No Effort" video.

The absolutely ceaseless smattering of puns is why I love this channel.

When I was a kid we called those "coffee timers", at least in my family. Namely, it was a timer into which you plugged the coffee pot. A few years ago I went to the store and asked where they had "coffee timers". They looked at me like I was speaking Greek.

If you want a timing sequence that has a period longer than 24 hours, you can plug one timer into another. The second timer runs only when it gets current from the first. You can get really complicated switching patterns that way, but it is really confusing...

Hey, it's the timer I sent you like 3 years ago! 😅 Thank you so much for such a cool video involving the old 1970's timer. Your "why are electric switches clicky" video had just come out and I figured you might find something interesting to say about the mechanism. Wow, wasn't expecting a whole video on timer switches as I didn't think there was much to them! Also total win on the plug detents.

If you want to store the tabs and not mess up the timing, just put both « on » tabs next to each other and both « off » tabs next to each other. Since they won’t mess up the actual timing, you can just use the spaces between the first on/off switches as storage.

It is kind of heart warming to see how much well deserved attention is given to such a humble everyday item. I can almost see them blush as you present their simple innards.

I always liked how these very old timers with mechanical switches had a bit of natural variance in their on/off times as they worked to overcome the force of toggling... A little deviation in the times can make for a more natural look than hard-timed perfection of newfangled digital timers. (Although now we have programmed-in randomness on some units I've seen, to make lights look more "human" which is also neat)

The removable tabs can be stored on the timer. Just insert all the spare "on" taps into a time span where its already on, and the spare off ones into a time span where its already off. This has issues if you only want it to be on or off for a very short period each day, but otherwise works pretty well (or at least it did for me back when I used the exact timer you showed). Sadly they tended to wear out pretty fast when used 24/7. Great for seasonal use though.

You can store the removable tabs right next to the in-use tabs. For example put 3 ON tabs together right after the desired ON time and 3 OFF tabs together right after the desired OFF time. That's what I do for my outdoor landscape light transformer timer.

Thank you for always making me interested in things I never even notice. These devices are so standard in terrarium or aquarium setups that I took them for granted. They're surprisingly nifty!!

Something I love about your videos (among other things) is how there's a sort of "Technology Connections curriculum," for a lack of a better words, that builds off of previous knowledge I already know (or have the opportunity to learn by clicking the i card). There's almost a certain chronology to it, yet it doesn't necessitate watching every video in order. Additionally, this enhances my knowledge about all of the *connections* between various *technologies.* Hmm, I guess that's why it's called that...

I would be willing to say Intermatic likely was the first company that made timer switches. They are still around today making things like pool timers, but their staple is delay on, delay off, and even more sophisticated relays! EDIT: Tab storage - It's literally right there!!!! To store the tabs, you set the tab for on, and then place the rest of the "on" tabs in the section where it will be on... Then set your off time and place the remaining "off" tabs in the section where it will be off. Too bad they never bothered to put that in the instructions...

I’d really love to see an ice maker episode! They’ve always fascinated me and it would be very cool to see you do it!

I can't believe how you weren't absolutely furious with how these digital timers are unintuitive. Maybe it's just these I have ever used. And as always, amazing video!

After rewatching the "holes in plugs" video just yesterday, I was not expected to find relief from my resulting frustration so soon and surprising.

I always enjoy your comedic timing. It runs until the moment just before it becomes tremendous cringe and then moves on. Dunno how that timing gets nailed down but I like it

I was hoping you would cover my favorite doo--dad, the timer I use for my holiday (Halloween and Chrismas) lights: it plugs into the wall (or in my case my outdoor plug) and has three outlets on it. It also has a dial that allows you to either turn it on, or set it to 2, 4, 6, 8 or "all night". It has an electric eye that detects when it gets dark and turns on the lights for the specified time. It is one of the most insanely useful things I have ever bought...

There are 96 of these "switches" on the DeLonghi Oil filled heater I have , each for every 15 minutes , and very , very tiny to pull or push each up or down... they took it to a whole new level!

Half of your videos I'm excited to learn how a thing works. The other half I'm like, "yeah, yeah, I bet I know how this works," but then not only do I still learn a whole bunch, but you make it entertaining. You rock :)

So some years ago I was going on a little over 2 week vacation in winter, and wanted hot water ready for tea on my return home. So I plugged my ELECTRIC KETTLE, switched on, into a mechanical 24hr timer like this set at just before midnight programmed to switch on at "2am". I then plugged that timer into a digital weekly timer set to run for exactly 1 hour at just before the time & day-of-week I was set to arrive home. And I left. A couple of days later, 2 weeks before my return, the digital timer turned on for exactly 1 hour, which advanced the mechanical timer to just before 1 am, and then shut off. A week later, and 1 week before my return, the digital timer again turned on for an hour and ran the mechanical timer to just before 2 am. And then another week later, just before my return time from the airport, the digital timer fired up for another hour. A few minutes later the mechanical timer finally got to "2am" and turned on the full kettle which boiled the water and then, after waiting over 2 weeks, finally clicked off. The result: my tea water was boiled and ready perfectly on cue waiting for me to arrive. Which I did many hours later due to a delayed flight. Aww shucks.

"Like a door that's left its frame, that intro was unhinged" You sir, are a national treasure

I'm so happy to have stumbled upon your channel a couple months ago. I've learned so many things about the complexity of things I took for granted. And I find myself more curious than ever about how things work nowadays.

I'm glad that you found receptacles that engage with the holes in the plugs! You and I both seem to have been suspicious about this for years (well, more years for me), so it's nice to find at least something that actually uses the holes.

I’ve got that timer with the lose-able blades! I found that since having multiple on or off blades in a row doesn’t affect anything, I’d store all of the off next to each other, and all of the on next to each other. Only an issue if you wanted the on/off cycle to be 15 mins. But this explains the hum from it! I figured it was related to the grid hz, but didn’t really register that there’s an entire motor in there!!!

Ngl, my favorite time of year is No-Effort November. Its always super cool and even tho its called "No-Effort" there is always a lot of effort put into all of your videos.

My stepdad was OBSESSED with these things! We had, at minimum 8 different lights attached to separate timers at all times. I'm not sure if he wanted to make it look like people were always home or just didn't like turning on the lights manually lol! Major flashbacks as soon as you pulled out that Intermatic one!

These sort of devices are quite common in Finland, where places like workplace or some apartment parking lots need to be able to heat up cars at winter! I remember freezing my fingers off every time i had to figgle one of those to turn on at 4AM and off at 6AM when I was leaving my nightshifts at - 30°C. The warm car felt nice👌

Great topic, and great video, as always! My family has been using these kinds of timers since the late 1960s, when my grandparents first found out about them. (Religious Jews don't turn electrical things on and off on sabbath and holidays, so we use these timers to make life on those days more convenient.) After doing a bit of research to identify the picture burned into my brain, I think my grandparents' first one was an Intermatic Time-All Model A-211, which had a power cord, stood upright on molded-in feet, looked something like a big alarm clock and had the override switch on the right side. That timer might've outlasted my grandparents. My wife bought a timer exactly like your first one when she was in college in the mid 1980s. She still had it when we got married, and we used it (dare I say religiously? 🤣) for about 20 years, at which point it failed. I don't remember if one of the plastic parts of the switch broke off or the motor burned out, but whatever killed it, she definitely got her money's worth out of it. At some point, I bought two timers exactly like your second. Each came with two sets of trippers, and I did exactly what you implied in the video, and when I needed one of the timers to turn a light on and off three times over a 24-hour period, I borrowed two trippers from the other timer. I also discovered, as you mentioned, that those trippers are ridiculously easy to lose, so at this point I think I have one timer with two sets of trippers on its dial and the other has two OFF triippers (but no ON trippers) on its dial. Oh, well... I also have timers similar to, but not exactly like, your last two. In addition, I have one programmable in-wall timer that replaces a light switch. Acquiring that was something of a production. My first such timer was a relatively simple model that got its power from the household current. That was fine until CFL spiral bulbs that fit into most fixtures came out, and I quickly discovered that my wall timer was incompatible with those. Apparently, it depended on the filament resistance of incandescent bulbs in some way, and having even one CFL in my dining room chandelier caused all the bulbs to flicker and the timer to make funny noises. So, I had to stick with incandescent bulbs in that fixture until I discovered a wall timer that used a pair of AA batteries to run the clock and operate a mechanical switch to turn the lights on and off. That worked fine no matter what kind of bulbs I put in the light fixture. It was a bit annoying in that the switch made a curious sound when turned the lights on or off, which took some getting used to, and it went through several sets of batteries per year. It lasted for about 10 years, after which the plastic hook that held the battery compartment in broke, and I had to replace it. The updated model offers relatively complex programming, auto daylight savings time adjustment (obsolete since the last DST rules change), switching the lights at dawn and dusk, and a lot of other features. It uses some sort of camera battery instead of AAs, but it also uses a more efficient electronic switch instead of a mechanical one, so each battery lasts several years.

These videos are always so interesting, and I always look forward to your deep dives into historical tech. They remind me of episodes of the old British show The Secret Life of Machines.

The ones with the individual pins that pull out are handy to use with an iron that doesn't have an auto-off switch. When using your iron, just plug it into a timer that only has Off pins set. Set the Off pin for the maximum time you'll be using the iron. If you forget to unplug the iron or turn it off, you have a safety backup.

I worked with a variant of those devices at a hotel: it was an alarm clock with slidable tabs all around the dial at fifteen minute intervals. We used it to make manual wake-up calls to rooms. Each tab set would make it buzz until we hit a switch to silence it, then we would look at a list to see which rooms to call. Four-star service, baby!

We have almost that exact third timer (with the depressible switches) and it is connected to a floor lamp that clicks on at 7:30 AM and wakes me up, and shuts itself off at 8:30 AM. In combination with a Fitbit and a silent alarm, mornings are much more pleasant now. Instant sunrise!

Really enjoy these deep dives into every day items. Your presentation is perfect

A bigger cousin to these would be older mechanical traffic controllers. They have a timer that rotates continuously and has tabs set at various places to adjust the percentage of time for a given indication. The actual sequence of lights is controlled by the cam, which is stepped each time a timer tab trips the switch. Thus with two systems, the timer and the cam, you have a unit that can control in what order the lights go and for how long each step is. Acme School has an episode on them, but it would be neat to see you do your take on them as well since you have the traffic modules in the back wall display.

I have had that second white one my entire life and since it’s the only one I’ve ever needed I thought it was the pinnacle of outlet timer technology. The digital one blew my mind!😂

I just bought my first house, a 1952 bungalow. I wish I could have you just be a consultant on my renovations. Your videos have been an invaluable asset!

This is by far, my favorite youtube channel. Never stop what you do.

I hope you do a video on electronic pocket dictionaries and spell checkers one day, those were so neat. Love your channel!

I use an outdoor version of the 3rd mechanical one with the 48 pins to control my pool pump. I have it set to run for one hour at 3 different times each day. Pretty handy and quite reliable!

I love these analog, ultra-mechanical timers. I have that first one and it's great for setting up an indoor grow lamp for plants.

Another enjoyable dive into a common, overlooked household gadget. I really like the early "pre wall wart" style Intermatic Time-Alls that sat on a table and had a power cord. Just neater IMO.

I’m 47 and those Intermatics gave me a powerful blast of nostalgia. My grandfather used to use those a bunch in his house. I remember walking around as a little kid thinking they looked so cool and complicated. Got older, he passed, and I found a few of his laying around. They are very cool, and fairly bullet proof. I’d much much rather have that ‘70s Intermatic than the one with the digital programmable display. Those are a pain to program.. and then after you learn it you forget the next year when you have to do it again. Now a days of course, smart home IoT devices do all this. Yep, nostalgia.

The oldest clock switch I've ever owned was from my grand father's chicken coop. Looking back I think it pre dated WW2. It was a large black metal case with an actual pendulum clock inside and a small 24 hour dial with metal arrows you could set to program on and off times. Too bad I threw it away somewhere in the mid eighties :(

I remember having these as a kid. I was born in the mid-80s, and I remembering playing with them in my earliest memories. They were already considered old at that point, so your assessment of them being from the 70s seems in line with that. The non-polarized plug thing made them tricky even back then.

You are so cool & I love this amazing channel that you’ve built. You rock so much & I’m so glad that you make this stuff for us. Been watching you for awhile now & im so thankful I found this channel. It’s so intricate & cool & interesting even when the stuff is “obsolete” or “redundant.” Thank you for bringing us many many hours of curiosity & joy in learning. In this case the info is also useful, but it’s almost always so fascinating.

Looks like it's time for 'Just the right amount of effort' January. I have both of the 'modern' versions of the timer switches in use in my house, and found that doubling up the green/red tabs so that both 'on' or 'off' instances occur in succession is a handy way of storing the tabs without impacting the functionality. The only issue I have with these is that some of the heating pads I want to use them with require a manual power button press on the cord to turn on due to a safety feature. I guess we're not phosisticated enough to have that work just yet.

I love these silly timers and always wondered how they worked. My grandma had pin-based ones, eventually upgraded to digital (which I had to program for her!). Now that im a responsomable adulting person, I decided to go for a basic "built-in pins" version for my xmas light festivities. And thanks for pinning the comment about wattage - I hooked my watt monitor up to see what the tree uses (btw, YIKES, 180w), and was surprised that the timer itself consumed a few watts. Mine also makes a faint but clearly audible ticking noise, and now that you showed me the gear box, I know why! Thanks!

I remember those mechanical timers well, mainly because my parents had a handful of them around the house when I was growing up, and KEPT them around for years. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they still have at least one of them in a drawer somewhere, and that they've actually used it to turn their lights on when on vacation in recent years. They were very much like that first timer you demonstrated, though I don't think any of them were that exact model. But it's really cool now to finally see how they work!

the big brother of this is the sangamo weston street light timer and outdoor lighting timer, its excetionally well made and the on/off tabs are moved mechanically by some extra curved metal pieces to account for seasonal variation in dawn/dusk. Thinking of carparks they even added a little wheel to exclude days of the week. Everything in it is mechanical and basic but btilliant. its been updated over the years but i like the 70s versions the best

I was SHOCKED to see no Smart Electrician logos on the last two timers brought out. I just know how much Alec loves that specific Midwest home improvement store chain.

A fantastic alarm clock! Mine turns on the CD player, the lamp, starts coffee, and has never failed in thirty years.

Neat teardown, I'm liking "November in January"! I once built a few "industrial grade" electromechanical timer units for a client who owned a quality control company. They tested fabric samples (among a variety of other things) for parameters like durability, colourfastness, and resistance to colour fade in strong sunlight which was simulated by exposing samples to a bank of powerful UV lamps for a calculated period of time. They were using typical off-the-hardware-store-shelf electromechanical timers for the lamps as Alec demonstrates here, but they kept failing as the high inrush current of the lamp ballasts exceeded the switch contact rating in these consumer-grade units... they would arc every time they switched on and eventually weld themselves closed, even though the steady-state current draw was only about 6A per unit (well below the 10A @ 240V nominal rating which is standard for consumer power outlets and switching hardware here in Australia). I couldn't do anything to limit the inrush current to the ballasts because then the lamps wouldn't strike and could possibly sustain damage or have a reduced lifespan, and these lamps were _expensive_ , like "replacement lamp for your high-end home theatre projector" type of money. So I sourced some "Heavy Duty" electromechanical timer modules from Farnell (now Element14) which had a peak rating of 16A for the switch contacts and a nominal rating of 12A. They were of the type that feature two concentric rings of closely-spaced holes on the timer dial - one for On times and the other for Off times - which accept metal pins to set the program. The closeness of the hole spacing allowed for control of on/off intervals down to 5 minutes i.e. 12 divisions per hour in each of the "On" and "Off" rings, which suited the application perfectly. There was a very simple "pin sliding in slot" type of flush-mounted manual override switch on the side of the unit, and nice chonky screw terminals for the mains wiring. They were not cheap. The programming pins were incredibly easy to lose (even though there were a few additional holes on the face of the unit to store unused pins) and they were a bit fiddly to use when setting timing intervals but apart from that it was a pretty solid design, and in this application we were only interested in a few specific time periods so it was a set-and-forget kind of deal. Installed them in grounded metal enclosures into which I fitted heavy-duty mains input/switched output sockets and a suitably rated fuseholder + slow-blow fuse. As far as I'm aware, they were still working fine when he eventually wrapped up the company in the 2010s about a decade after I supplied them, and would probably have gone on for another couple of decades with no issues. There's something to be said for the reliability of the good ol' geared-synchronous-motor-just-flipping-a-switch design. :)

A great and phosisticated video! A german Wiki article about „Zeitschaltuhren“ (timed switching clocks) dates the first iterations in the first half of the last century

Alec, it is unbelievable to me how we have at some point in our lives probably had the same ward niche interest in some seemingly mundane object and this is another one. I've gone through periods of mini obsessions with timer switches several times, to the point that I have a collection of them. Tons of intermatic Time-All's and plenty of other weird ones, like one particularly unique very old 1930's? Art Deco one with a mechanical wind up clock, I love these things!

Gotta say, I agree with you on the pleasing simplicity of a timer that just is clock-switch and nothing else.

I remember these timers. I remember my grandparents using these back in the 70’s to deter possible thieves. If they saw lights coming on and going off they would think someone was home.

watching you video just gives peace idk anything about timers this gave me a great insight

I honestly never thought that hard about how the old-school non-digital timer switches actually work. So this was interesting.

Wonderful! Clock switches are the first steps into automation. I remember adapting one to control the millivolt circuit on a gas heater in an apartment I was renting. One of those through the wall vented heaters with no electrical connection. So it would turn on before I had to get out of bed in the morning...

thank you for all you do. i had one of those timers that had an option to change the on and off times daily randomly. have not seen one since the 1990's

I've got a bunch of the type with the removable tabs. We put them on a few lights any time we'll be out of town for more than a few days so lights come on and off, making it look like people are home to reduce the chance of someone attempting to burgle. Also useful for my grow lights I use to grow herbs in the winter (no window sunlight here in NY winter).

I have the second timer. You store the extra tabs by just plugging them into the dial. As you pointed out, they perform a no-op if they are on a part of the dial where the event they handle is already triggered.

Alec, you amaze me every time with the topic you cover on your channel, you talk about everyday objects that like almost everyone has at home. And they're incredibly interesting. This video inspired me to check out what kind of different timer switches I have at home, just gotta find 'em lol

I like the mention of the use for sign lighting. Having worked in the sign business most of my life, I can definitely say that photocells are not a great solution as they do not last long at all. Most people who want to go the route of photocells instead of timers do it just because it’s cheaper and doesn’t require access into the breaker panel. I will always try to pitch timers just because of their reliability

I have that exact model of 2nd timer for my Christmas tree every year. Always cool to see your exact product in these videos

It's so satisfying that the 48-tab design has barely changed in 40+ years! The one we bought for our Christmas lights differs only aesthetically from the ones my mom had for her Christmas lights.

these things go way back, there are also the hard wired full metal type. Also, I love when you pull something out and its the exact model I've had around the house basically my whole life lol

I really appreciate these random videos. Long time subscriber and still very satisfied. Thanks!

The title is the shortest complete news article. It succinctly introduces the subject and gives exactly enough information for my level of interest. Beginning and end. There is nothing else I care to know on this topic. The video is the better part of 20 minutes? Yeah, alright. I'll watch it.

Great video as always! That doorway pun was great, on par with "like being handcuffed to a roll of quarters, things are bound to change"

I swear when I was a kid (late 80's early 90's) we had a timer that looked very similar to the first one but with removable metal tabs. It was in the laundry room. I think it somehow was wired up with the hot water tank outside so it would stop heating around midnight and then kick back in around 5 in the morning. But it's been so long I couldn't be a reliable source. Also I was 10 the last time I saw that thing.

I also love how through the video there is this much needed theme of "technology is becoming overcomplicated" going through it. Like not everything needs wifi and an app to work. And in fact, it makes it more likely to break and fail.

Oh, hey I made a comment regarding this on the Connextra sights and sounds video for the Statesman. I'm just glad that this was covered since it felt like the topics were heading this way in regards to electromechanical items. This also answers my musing about what manner of system it uses regarding time keeping (how it uses the frequency of the electricity to keep track of the time in conjunction with some gear reduction). Anyway, that last unit was really, really similar to the selection wheel on the Statesman and kind of awesome that something so different in use has a similar structure at its core.

To keep from losing the little on/off pegs, I used to put the on pegs next to each other on the time wheel. I then can move them if need a second time segment.

Lol! What a call back to the holes in plugs video!

0:54 Best part ever. Thank You Alec for this kind of humor. I love it!

Really informative and technical review of a vintage timer! I appreciate your videos! Thankyou :)

Variants of the third design are common as muck in the UK, albeit with 96 tabs (15 minute intervals) - but as they age, the gearing becomes increasingly loud, so I relegated them to controlling porch / outdoor Christmas lights, and bought the fourth type for indoors.

Love timmer switches. I use them for all of my lamps. It is so much nicer than walking into a dark apartment. I prefer mechanical timmers to digital timers. It is also a great alarm clock in the morning for a heavy sleeper like myself. Set the timer, trigger a light coming on, it's like waking to the sunrise.

Solid work as always.

I have a few of those with the removal tabs. They work great, and came in handy when I did a lot of travelling.

Picked up a basic timer, like the one with built in pegs you showed, at Christmas for my tree lights. Cost £3 from the local hardware shop. So cheap and simple. They even had a version with a week timer on it, instead of 24hr. Just meant the outside wheel moved very slowly as they’d squeezed in an entire week on it.

i rarely saw these things growing up. i thought they were neat but i was also curious how they worked for the exact amount of time they were in my field of view. thanks for the awesome videos on interesting stuff as well as a bonus bloopers! :D

Hey there! Thanks for the videos; love your choice of topics and the deep dives you take. I use one of these timers for my Christmas lights. It's a little different from the ones you showed. It has forty-eight fixed tabs that can be set individually in half-hour increments. That allows the device to be turned off and on at different times and intervals throughout the day. I'm not quite sure why you'd want that level of control, but it just goes to show that there is no limit to human ingenuity. Thanks again and keep up the great work! It is truly appreciated.

That was a nice simple video to watch. One of the houses i lived in use to have a wind up timer on the furnace gas supply. .

A Technology Connections video on a device I don't care about? I am going to watch every second of this. And... it's going be entirely too interesting. You've done it again!

We use one with removable tabs for our electric water heater. In that case, there's no outlet 'cause it's directly wired. Your older video on how the US gets 240V power actually helped me diagnose an issue we were having where the heater was only connected to Ground, +120V, and neutral instead of +120V, -120V, and ground like it was supposed to be, and so we weren't getting enough hot water. Very helpful video, thanks!

I have to say I really appreciate knowing that modern timer switches are literally just a clock with a plastic arm that holds down a button at certain hours.

Consistently excellent content, thank you.

I still have one of those Intermatic timers. I used to use it to control my outdoor Christmas lights. And yeah, those little tabs can be lost easily.

Nice video. Did you ask Intermatic if they could help date the old timer? They are based in Chicago burbs.

I could watch you explain any damn thing. I am fully on board at this point. 💪

Since you were wondering, the wires probably aren't soldered. It's a technique called wire wrapping which predates the widespread use of solder and still is used occasionally to connect components that don't take solder well. Although, it normally works best on leads with a square cross section as it bites into the wrapped wire a bit better.

welcome back!!! i always look forward to your videos!!!

Excellent video! A great use for these timers today are for pets! I have 2 similar ones to the 3rd 48-tab version. 1 is for the basking and UV lamps for my Russian Tortoise and the other for my fish tank lights. I set them to turn on the lights during the day and off when it gets dark so I don't have to do it manually. It's very convenient!

That looks ridiculously easy to program! I have one of those stupid ones with the lcd on the front and a bunch of buttons needed to program it. I seriously had to look up how to program it! I need to buy a similar one to this.

Maybe you should look into mechanical sprinkler timers? I have always found them very interesting, especially the RainBird RC series.

I watch your videos to help me fall asleep. It rarely actually works because you make the most mundane subjects interesting. And the puns are great