Sharing my current clock collection

[Albano B.]

Hey everybody,

Hope everyone is doing well! Not sure if this is the right forum to post this in (maybe it should be in the "your newest clock acquisition" forum instead?) but for anyone that might be interested, I thought I'd share a clock overview YouTube video I recently made. In it, I exhibit all of the clocks currently in my possession, starting with a brief intro of each, followed by running through its hour chime/strike sequence.

The video can be found here:



I hope you all enjoy this! I certainly love sharing these clocks.

All my best,

Albano.

 

[bruce linde]

nice... as a fellow musician i really appreciate your attention to the sound of your clocks... are you able to work on them?

 

[Vernon]

Hi Albano,
You have a nice collection so far. What are you be looking for as your next acquisition?

 

[Albano B.]

nice... as a fellow musician i really appreciate your attention to the sound of your clocks... are you able to work on them?

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it. As to your question... I'm trying to learn how to work on these clocks. As of now, I've managed to figure out how to oil a clock, although so far, I've only managed to do that with my little time only "experimenting" clock. I've also managed to readjust the chime drum on the Junghans tambour and the ST Sonora, as both of them came with out of sync chimes. I can also do basic things like hammer adjustments, beat setting, etc... That said, there are still lots more things that I don't know than there are things that I do know, and I wish I could find someone with more experience with whom I can learn more. There may or may not be things I can't do as a blind person, but I haven't been able to figure out those limitations yet. My next goal is to tackle letting down springs safely... And I won't lie, I'm moderately intimidated by this idea.

 

[Isaac]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it. As to your question... I'm trying to learn how to work on these clocks. As of now, I've managed to figure out how to oil a clock, although so far, I've only managed to do that with my little time only "experimenting" clock. I've also managed to readjust the chime drum on the Junghans tambour and the ST Sonora, as both of them came with out of sync chimes. I can also do basic things like hammer adjustments, beat setting, etc... That said, there are still lots more things that I don't know than there are things that I do know, and I wish I could find someone with more experience with whom I can learn more. There may or may not be things I can't do as a blind person, but I haven't been able to figure out those limitations yet. My next goal is to tackle letting down springs safely... And I won't lie, I'm moderately intimidated by this idea.

Nice collection! As a fellow lover of chime clocks, I would highly recommend you don't start out letting the Sonora chime movement mainspring down. A proper let-down tool makes the process a lot safer than trying to use a key.

 

[Albano B.]

Hi Albano,
You have a nice collection so far. What are you be looking for as your next acquisition?

Hi Vernon,

Thanks, I'm pretty proud of this collection so far. I've actually be quite excited that I've been able to acquire some of my most sought after clocks relatively quickly... Those being a model 10 dual chime Herschede and a dual chime Celebrate with Trinity chimes... That one is off being repaired at the moment, and will hopefully be ready soon. That said, there are still a few other things I'd like to have, including:

1. A Junghans Westminster bracket clock that's actually in tune. My nonfunctional one looks nice, but its chime rods are very out of tune to my sadly perfect pitch-trained ears. Here's one that sounds gorgeous to me:

2. A Kienzle tambour clock with deeper-sounding rods, like this one:

3. A Jauch triple chime wall clock. The chimes on these are always super clear and bright, and the hour strike is a beauty to behold. Here's an example:

 

[Albano B.]

Nice collection! As a fellow lover of chime clocks, I would highly recommend you don't start out letting the Sonora chime movement mainspring down. A proper let-down tool makes the process a lot safer than trying to use a key.

Thanks, Isaac. Yeah, that Sonora chime spring is terrifying to me, based on the monstrous size of the barrel, and how exhausting it is to wind. It's also a bit problematic, as lately, the clock has taken to occasionally not chiming at the three quarter mark, resulting in the chimes going out of sink and having to be reset. I'm suspecting chime spring and/or winding arbor problems, as the energy release doesn't seem very even, and the spring makes mild to moderate flumping noises during the chimes. I'm also finding that the winding arbor seems to be changing positions... Sometimes it's wedged right up against the left side of its hole in the bezel, sometimes its on the bottom or right side of the whole, and sometimes it's right in the middle. I'm wondering if maybe the arbor is bent.

In any case, once I pick up a letdown tool, I think I'll start by releasing the mainspring on my little German time-only learning clock. Then I can work upward from there.

 

[gleber]

I wish I could find someone with more experience with whom I can learn more.

You have come to the right place. There are a lot of people here with a lot of experience and more than willing to share. Where are you located? I don't mean to pry, but what type of resources are most beneficial to you? I presume you have a reader for use with this message board.

Tom

 

[Albano B.]

You have come to the right place. There are a lot of people here with a lot of experience and more than willing to share. Where are you located? I don't mean to pry, but what type of resources are most beneficial to you? I presume you have a reader for use with this message board.

Tom

Hi Tom,

Thanks much for your reply! During the few months that I have been on this board, I have learned a great deal just by reading topics relating to my various clock woes. I have also be incredibly grateful to everyone that has offered suggestions, advice, and also words of support.

To answer your questions... I live in Boston, MA. I actually realized earlier this afternoon that I hadn't filled out any of my profile with info like that, so I went ahead and did that. As for resources... Anything goes really. Well, except photo-based content. Sadly I can't interact with that, though as you said, I do have a screen reader that allows me to interact with my computer/phone pretty effectively. Honestly, what I'd really like right now is to have someone give me some terminology... I've read so much already, but it would be nice to be able to point at one part or another and have someone tell me what it is, be it in person or through a video chat of some sort. I've figured out a lot already I think, but there's still so much I don't know, which makes diagnosing problems difficult just by reading how-to articles. Another thing that would be incredibly educational for me is to (some day) take a clock apart alongside someone experienced, and really figure out how it all fits together, inside the plates as well as out. That's one thing I've yet to get into, partly out of fear of those mainsprings...

 

[Albano B.]

On another note, I must admit, folks, I'm rather proud of myself this evening. I actually managed to figure out what was wrong with my Junghans A-11 clock and fix it. Some months ago, my father and I took its movement out, just so I could take a look at it... But we must have messed with it somehow, because ever since then, the clock would strike the correct number of hours on every hour except one. At one, it would strike four for several days, and eventually, when it got to the one o'clock strike, it would start striking and would not stop unless I moved the minute hand so that the chime train went into warning and stopped the strike train.

Eventually, a few weeks ago I took the movement out again on my own and tried to figure out what was going on. After some time of just touching one part and following it to the next and then the next and so on, I discovered that what had happened was that the rack had fallen off the snail altogether and was resting on the hour shaft, completely out of reach of the gathering pallet, and thereby resulting in the endless striking. Am I using these terms correctly? Anyways, after some experimenting, I figured out that if I lifted the rack back up to position, the hour strike behaved again. So, thinking that was the end of that, I put it all back together and got the clock going again.
Unfortunately, when it got to be one again, the same thing happened. For a few days, it struck four or five, and then eventually, the rack fell off again, and the clock started striking endlessly. Unfortunately, it chose to do this at one AM one night... It was quite disorienting waking up to a clock that wouldn't stop striking, I can tell you!

Well, as of today, after much more tactile tracing of how different moving parts all work together, I finally figured out what the problem was... Somehow, the wheel with the snail on it had been turned slightly, so that when the snail was at the one o'clock position, it was just enough out of true that the rack tail would either miss it and fall down to three or four, or would miss the snail altogether and just fall down all the way. So, after some tinkering, I detached the wheel, turned it about two teeth to the right, and re-attached it... And voila! All hour strikes now work perfectly, including one o'clock, and the rack is no longer tempted to fall off.

Of course, this little bit of repair only scratches the surface of the issues this clock has... Sluggish chime train, probable need of new bushings, etc... But this is currently far beyond me. Nonetheless, it was incredibly exciting to be able to fix this one issue that involved more than an out-of-beat pendulum or chattering hammers!

 

[gleber]

Congratulations on the repair. If you are concerned about springs, you should look for an Ogee or single weight time only clock to experiment with. You could work on the time side only if it strikes.

It sounds like you have used the correct terminology for the striking parts.

Tom