So, first clock for me to work on. It's a God awful small affair and might take a while but will share some photos in case anyone is interested.

Here's what I bought and it's a Westminster chiming Smiths (Made in England) Mantle clock. From the Fifties, I suspect, with a K6A (522) calibre. Runs for a few hours but stops.


Rear door open and you can see the hammers which strike the horizontal rods to make the chimes. Takes me back to Sundays sitting quietly (or else!) reading in my Grandfather's front room.


De-cased and there's a lot going on at the front plate. Three barrels and clicks at the lower. The right side and barrel run the chimes, the left the hour striking and the centre runs the clock train. The bar on the left works to turn off the chimes for night time. I've lots of photos of this at various times to realign all the parts so it strikes correctly.

A rear view showing the train for the chimes on the left and the long bar on the right works the hour striking on three of the four notes. In the middle is where the pendulum attaches. Plenty of WD40 here....


In the top view, it's clear there are a lot of wheels!

There are 4 hammers so 4 different notes and they strike in these orders (1 at the dial) with the hour counting being after the 12 O'Clock strikes using three of the notes. There are 5 different sequences so, it's pretty clever.


Front plate pretty much stripped and it's fairly clear this is dirty from the clean areas where parts have been removed. Lots of WD40 again....


Back plate removed and these are the wheels between plates.


Lots of parts in these clocks and only 20% will fit in the cleaning machine so, lots of hand cleaning.


Good news is that there is little wear in all the pivot holes in the plates so no re-bushing required. Am struggling to separate the cannon pinion (that's what I'm calling it) so can't get the central shaft out yet.

Watch tools are useless for this scale so it's all small car tools to take it apart. Excuse for a picture of the head off the E-Type!


Two of the three springs are conical so will be buying three new springs but that's no real cost. Got to be careful with these as there is a huge energy in them and I might get a Watchmaker to install them as it's not worth buying a tool for my one clock. Will see if I can install the flat one by hand without deforming it first as then I could install all myself.

More when I've moved on.

Cheers, Chris

 

Looking at that cylinder head takes me back to a previous life with my wife reading out the sequence whilst I adjusted the tappets.
Happy days when you could work on your at that time modern car.

 

Knock it off with the Bowie quotes Chris

Fair play to you though for the latest adventure - you are entering @JimInOz territory.

 

That rang a bell and I couldn't place it

 

Ha, have been through my dozen Bowie albums today. One beer per album...

Worryingly, my vinyl version of Blackstar is on it's way. Clear vinyl, lithograph print as my wife ordered it for me for Christmas. Apparently, they are going for a lot of money on eBay. I will just open it as it will mean more to me than a few thousand bucks. Vultures is the right word.

http://exclaim.ca/music/article/shi...up_the_price_of_david_bowies_blackstar_online

Cheers, Chris

 

Nice grab, even with the timing.

Does that mean my Tin Machine CD has doubled in price?

 

My wife's a dab hand at noting clearances and passing me spanners. Mind you, 1/2 inch, 7/16 or so on doesn't work - just small, medium or large....

 

Nothing would surprise me. According to the various TV programmes this week, we were both struggling through the early Seventies when Bowie played Starman/Jean Genie on TOTP and showed us we could "be whatever we wanted". What a load of bo#*#cks.

Been a hard week.

Cheers, Chris

 

This is a bit more adventurous tham my 1950s Seimens 3/4 second master clock I just rebuilt. At least yours was only WD40 encrusted, mine had about a gallon of green motor oil dowsed over it. Why not buy a can of clock cleaning solution, just chuck everything in there to soak for a couple of hours an bob's your aunties live in lover! Beats hand cleaning and will look very shiny when finished. Good Luck

 

if you can take duel cams off, you should be able to remove a large cannon pinion. if you read the manual.

 

Motor oil. Good plan on the cleaning. Am close to changing watch cleaning fluid so will try that first but your idea sounds far easier.
Love the quote and oddly, Bob really is my Uncle.. Hmm.
Now, what about pics of that Siemens?

There's a manual! I will sort it but ran out of time today. Engines are simple in relation to clocks...

Cheers, Chris

 

good show ! I guess there are no manuals these days, DARN web sites! vinn

 

https://omegaforums.net/threads/and-what-did-you-buy-today.8930/page-235#post-369413
pics of my siemens here, the 1950's electronics you see are super simple, and control the auto winder for the weight and the impulses to the slave clocks. Getting everything to work properly took a while. Now accutate to about 5 secs per week. Hopefully I can improve on that with a little more tinkering it's essentially a weight driven clock with a deadbeat escapement, with a twist.

 

http://mb.nawcc.org/archive/index.php/t-31028.html
you might also find this discussion useful plus others on that site.

 

yes, the 1950's clock. [ let me call it a mangnetic induction , pulse movment]. I also got one very cheap years ago. after cleaning some contacts, IT RAN FINE,BUT, I could not silence the chimes. SO, I spliced into the pos. wire, added a switch and a few inches of wire: and it never ran again.

 

The movement is a traditional weight driven deadbeat escapement and will run for 10 hours without power to it (until the weight hits the bottom of the case). The weight is wound up once per minute using a electromagnet operated lever through a series of gears. And the winding of the weight operates a cam which sends out a synchronisation pulse to any slave clocks. It is quite an ingenious meld of 17th century clock design and modern (for the 50's) technology. Now I just need to get my hands on an original slave clock must admit that my A-level in electronics did come i handy in making it all work

 

Impressive clock and certainly an interesting mechanical and electronic exercise. Complicated in a different way and mightily impressive to get it running well again.

That business of sending out pulses to synchronise slave clocks sounds well ahead of it's time. I wonder how well it works? Will be interested when you find a slave.

Cheers, Chris

 

Nice little project there, getting all of those wheels back in place will test your patience I'm sure.

I use a large pan of kerosene to do a first clean with a brush and pegwood and then a rinse in Shellite (lighter fluid).
Re-assembling takes time and patience and one essential tool is the "jiggler" that you use to push/pull the wheel shafts until the pivots drop into the top plate. You can make one from a thin rod or tube, or buy one like this.

Take care with the springs. I'd suggest a good heavy pair of gloves with coverage up to the elbow, you can cut a couple of fingers off to give some dexterity but make sure your important veins are protected. As you said, these things can store a huge amount of energy and when it lets go!!!!!!!!

Good luck with it and keep us updated.

 

Thanks for all the cleaning tips. Have been trying them out on one wheel.

Here it is removed from the clock. Very oily (mainly WD40, I think) and dirty.

Degreased and it's come up not too badly. The pivots only need a light burnish but looks a lot better.

And here after 5 minutes in a solution that some seem to use which is water/white wine vinegar (5:1). Then dried, then a few minutes dip in watch cleaning fluid and a final rinse with watch rinse.

The lighting is a lot better on the last picture but clearly all the tarnish has gone. I don't believe this has harmed it at all but I certainly wouldn't use it on the lacquered plates.

Thoughts? I don't like using anything water based but a lot of people seem to for clocks and the last idea certainly makes them come up well. I know you're not Jim...

Cheers, Chris

 

Looking good chris, the vinegar should't do any harm at all, much better than using amonia based solution which some suggest cause microfractures in the brass.