Does anyone know where in Chile, South America, Quartz crystals are mined? I have searched and searched and cannot discover the answer myself. Thank you to anyone who might know the answer!
you pass an electrical current through it...it will vibrate at a known frequency...therefore frequency standard for time....it's used in about every watch and clock in the world. others used are rubibium and cesium.
Quartz has special property known as piezoelectric effect, which makes it develop an electrical charge and a potential difference across its faces when subjected to a mechanical strain and its reverse, namely develop a mechanical strain if a voltage difference is applied across its faces. So by applying an alternating voltage or by applying a small pulse (like knockin it), it can be set to vibrate. Since it is also mechanically and chemically very stable, a frequency circuit built using a quartz crystal will be very stable since the feed-back from the crystal's natural frequency can be used to correct the frequency drift of the circuit.
