spring elasticity decrease. Temperature-compensated balance wheels The need for an accurate clock for celestial navigation during sea voyages drove many advances in balance technology in 18th century Britain and France. Even a 1-second per day error in a marine chronometer could result in a error in ship's position after a 2-month voyage. John Harrison was first to apply temperature compensation to a balance wheel in 1753, using a bimetallic ‘compensation curb’ on the spring, in the first successful marine chronometers, H4 and H5. These achieved an accuracy of a fraction of a second per day, but the compensation curb was not further used because of its complexity. A simpler solution was devised around 1765 by Pierre Le Roy, and improved by John Arnold, and Thomas Earnshaw: the Earnshaw or compensating balance wheel. The key was to make the balance wheel change size with temperature. If the balance could be made to shrink in diameter as it got warmer, the smaller moment of inertia would compensate for the weakening of the balance spring, keeping the period of oscillation the same. To accomplish this, the outer rim of the balance was made of a ‘sandwich’ of two metals; a layer of steel on the inside fused to a layer of brass on the outside. Strips of this bimetallic construction bend toward the steel side when they are warmed, because the thermal expansion of brass is greater than steel. The rim was cut open at two points next to the spokes of the wheel, so it resembled an S-shape (see figure) with two circular bimetallic ‘arms’. These wheels are sometimes referred to as "Z-balances". A temperature increase makes the arms bend inward toward the center of the wheel, and the shift of mass inward reduces the moment of inertia of the balance, similar to the way a spinning ice skater can reduce her moment of inertia by pulling in her arms. This reduction in the moment of inertia compensated for the reduced torque produced by the weaker balance spring. The amount of compensation is adjusted by moveable weights on the arms. Marine chronometers with this type of balance had errors of only 3–4 seconds per day over a wide temperature range. By the 1870s compensated balances began to be used in watches. Middle temperature error The standard Earnshaw compensation balance dramatically reduced error due to temperature variations, but it didn't eliminate it. As