Long story,don't know how to shorten it.My clock would gain hours now and then but never when I was watching,I thought it must be fluttering and raised the fork.For some reason the fork would not tighten on the suspinsion spring and I applied too much force and kinked the spring so I replaced it. Trouble is now it ran too fast so I tried thinning the spring and now it won't run for more than a few minutes. The clock is in beat and the escapement looks good to me. The pendulem rotates about one and one quarter revolutions per tick and gradually loses power and stops. I have stared at this thing until I am going blind and must have twenty hours invested in it by now.Any ideas? Remember it was running until I thinned the spring. Regards, Dutch
Long story,don't know how to shorten it.My clock would gain hours now and then but never when I was watching,I thought it must be fluttering and raised the fork.For some reason the fork would not tighten on the suspinsion spring and I applied too much force and kinked the spring so I replaced it. Trouble is now it ran too fast so I tried thinning the spring and now it won't run for more than a few minutes. The clock is in beat and the escapement looks good to me. The pendulem rotates about one and one quarter revolutions per tick and gradually loses power and stops. I have stared at this thing until I am going blind and must have twenty hours invested in it by now.Any ideas? Remember it was running until I thinned the spring. Regards, Dutch
Hi Dutch, how much pendulum rotation did the clock have before you thinned the spring? It sounds to me like (because you are getting so much pendulum rotation) the spring you have was too thick to successfully thin for your clock. What happens is the spring (due to being thinned to much) loses the strength to supply enough power to activate (via the fork) the anchor. At least, this is my understanding about thinning springs after asking John Hubby about a similar question in the past. Try another spring that does not need to be thinned much to do the job. Hope this is of some help! Cheers Peter
Thanks for the reply Peter, Sorry to say I did not notice how much rotation I had before I started working on this but one and a quarter turns seems to be too much to me especially since this pend unit is so heavy. Strangely enough when I replaced the spring using the Horolovar book as a guide the spring was about one eighth of an inch too long and the weights drug the bottom of the case.I don't understand that but the clock ran when I shortened it, just ran too fast. I will try changing the spring and see what happens. Regards, Dutch
Dutch, the replacement springs are always too long, and need to be cut to size to fit the clock. Your goal is to have a minumum clearance at the bottom without touching the cup or base. Too high will effect the timekeeping, too low will stop the clock. These clocks can be time consuming. With an 8 day clock in for repair, I keep it for at least 2 wind cycles before I give it back to my customer. On one of these, that would be 2 years, which is too long. I tell my customers to give me a month or so Having 1 1/4 rotation should be plenty to ensure that the clock runs, but how much extra swing do you have after the pallets lock and drop? Harold
Hello Harold, Of course I know the replacement srpings have to be cut but I said I used the Horolovar book for a pattern and on this model clock the weights are out of sight under the base plate and they drug on a bottom plate that most clocks do not have. I had about one inch swing after the escape wheel moved which is more than I have had on a lot of other clocks that ran. One of the main problems was that when I bought the clock it was in pieces and the pendulum is very different from any other clock and I had to make a couple of pieces for it,I am still not sure about securing the hands for they are different than most clocks too.The shaft that holds the canon pinon and hands screws into the front plate and the hand nut has a tendency to tighten up and stop the clock.I fixed that by applying some clear nail polish to the threads. I didn't mean to write a book here but the clock ran overnight after I lowered the fork less than 1/8" and the pend is turning just one rev. now. Hopefully it will run with fluttering which started all this mess. Regards, Dutch
Dutch, does your clock have embossed movement support columns (unpainted) or the white painted ones? The reason I ask is that the suspension spring for the embossed column models (both the blue & white and the silver & gold ones) is just about 1/8 inch shorter than for the earlier blue & white column clocks. Kaiser just made these that much shorter, and the unit in the Repair Guide is for the earlier models. John Hubby
Hello John, My clock has the painted white columns,can't explain why but I needed to remove about 1/8" off my spring. Maybe the pend. shaft length is wrong. In any case the clock is running and keeping time now. As heavy as the pendulum is I don't see how it keeps going at all. My clock was in pieces when I got it and I am not sure that it was all there,should there be two nuts to hold the minute hand in place? Have you had trouble with the nut on the end of the minute hand shaft tightning up and stopping the clock? Regards, Dutch
Dutch, yes there is supposed to be two hand nuts holding the hands in place. Take a look at Appendix 34, page 214 in the Repair Guide and you will see exactly what is supposed to be there both for the hour and minute pipes as well as the intermediate wheel and clutch. Also look at the exploded diagram of the pendulum in Appendix 68 page 218. It shows "mostly" how the pendulum is supposed to be assembled. Unfortunately it doesn't show that there are two pendulum weights that are adjustable but fixed in place by lock nuts, plus the two that are moveable by turning the center rod. One of these days I need to do a complete photo record of how to disassemble and reassemble one of these. John Hubby
