How Fast Can a Clock Tick Before Melting Down?

[unseenmage]

How fast do can clockworks tick?
How much faster can magically reinforced clockworks tick?

There's an old thread where Spell Clocks (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/cw/20070312a) are combined with the Stronghold Builder's Guide rules to make an impregnable flying box of doom.

In that thread it is suggested that the Spell Clocks could be set to go off several times per second. Which sounds absurd to my untrained, uninformed ear.

Can clockwork gears hold up under such speeds? If so how fast CAN they tick before melting down?
What of magically reinforced cogs and gears?

And yes, I realize the potential for this thread to kill cargirls. That is a risk that I am willing to take.

TLDR: How fast to clockworks tick before melting down from heat and stuff?

[Divine Susuryu]

As far as RAW goes, is there even a limit? I'm not aware of any rules that model frictional heating. There's also the fact that we don't really have any rules on the frequency at which spell clocks can go off - the only definite amount of time is "every hour", and even then that's not too precise.

In terms of in-universe solutions, gears made of force could be a logical thing to have in them, no wear and tear at all there.

[unseenmage]

RAW theres that bit in the DMG that says to use regular pgysical laws where appropriate IIRC.

Riverine gears would negate a lot of that though. Theres still going to be a physical limit I imagine after which even immortal force gears would be spinning fast enough to turn air into physics.

[Heliomance]

Ticking several times a second doesn't require relativistic speeds

[unseenmage]

Ticking several times a second doesn't require relativistic speeds

Of course not. But I was also wondering how fast it could theoretically go and if its composed of force effects relativistic speeds would seem to be the upper limit.

[weckar]

Except teleportation over any distance is possible, so bounding anything by relativistic speeds is meaningless.

[unseenmage]

Except teleportation over any distance is possible, so bounding anything by relativistic speeds is meaningless.

Please please design a clock whose gears Teleport. I greatly desire to see what that would be like.

[Climowitz]

A clock ticks 6 times per round give it haste and it will tick 12! Seriously how is this a legit question. Ask your dm how many times it can on his game since every dm might think different. I would set in ten times faster before it fails and needs calibration

[Jack_Simth]

RAW theres that bit in the DMG that says to use regular pgysical laws where appropriate IIRC.

Riverine gears would negate a lot of that though. Theres still going to be a physical limit I imagine after which even immortal force gears would be spinning fast enough to turn air into physics.
The solution to the air problem is to get rid of the air. Granted, that might be a little tricky, but if you, say, pick up Earth Glide, go deep into a big chunk of stone, cast Disintegrate to make an opening, leave, and then use Teleport Object to get your spell clock there... that'll do it for a time (rocks do outgass).

Powering the silly thing might be difficult, though.