If you understand the working principle of the Swiss lever escapement and if you are familiar with flexures, understanding this design should be straightforward. (If not, you can click on the links and have a look at the 3D models.)
In a way, anyone who ever played with a metal ruler (bending it) already knows enough about flexure beams to understand what is going on in this Zenith Defy Lab system. However, it is necessary to make use of Finite Element Analysis to develop and validate this type of design.
This model was reconstructed from illustrations found on the Internet (*). Using the CAD model of the monolithic silicon part, I performed FEM simulations with SolidWorks Simulations. Then, I exported the WRL deformed models and pursued the work in Blender (using shape keys).
*) This 2D drawing was particularly helpful.
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