We moved in to the house in 2003 and that battery died this year, so I would imagine that it is already or will very soon die. That said, if it's a backup battery and the electricity supply is stable then it may not make any difference.
https://www.rapidonline.com/yuasa-yuvolt-yucel-y1-2-6-valve-...
https://static.rapidonline.com/pdf/18-5207_v2.pdf
Design spec is up to 5 years. The one in the photo looks like it may have a date written in Sharpie on the side. I don't think it's 25 years old though. The "090323" on top could be DDMMYY indicating a battery from 2023.
If someone knew to replace the battery just three years ago, I would expect they also would have enough knowledge to set the clock itself. Or at least explain what was going on. Maybe this person isn't connected with the building anymore. But I would expect the new owners would be able to contact the old owners for help on this instead of sending a generalized call for help.
The building also was "out of operational use by Police Scotland for almost 10 years" and was purchased for community ownership earlier this year, according to [2]
> If someone knew to replace the battery just three years ago, I would expect they also would have enough knowledge to set the clock itself.
From the pictures, it looks like this clock needs to be manually changed on the last Sundays of March and October, for the start and end of daylight savings (they also need to be re-set any time there's a long power outage).
This article is dated early April; it's possible the new community owners of the building (and clock) just needed someone to adjust it by an hour.
The motor in the photo is probably a synchronous AC motor, where the rotation of the shaft matches the exact frequency of the AC supply. Then a long series of gears converts 50 rotations per second to 1 rotation per hour. Which avoids gradual clock drift - but without the fancy digital control needed to automate the daylight savings adjustments.
Nowerdays, you can buy 'clock controllers' [3] that take care of daylight savings time etc automatically.
[1] https://www.hardwarexpress.co.uk/pages/yuasa-date-codes [2] https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/edinburgh-plans-... [3] https://www.hawkinsclocks.co.uk/clock-controllers
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Yucel-Y1-2-6-Sealed-Rechargeable-Ba...
And I just found this EU Declaration of Conformity which includes the Y1.2-6 and says the date code is DDMMYY:
I could just hear the clockmaker James Martin calling me a butcher in his disapproving manner
Where do you get that from? Is this a confusion with dates spoken or written out in full as "March the 9th, 2023"? We're talking numeric form here, "090323" in the specific example, and I don't think the UK has ever used MDY for numeric forms.
I guess the confusing part is mostly because of an international audience. If everyone used MDY it would feel less weird. Still sorts completely wrong.