What Will Makes

Category: Horology

  • 30 Hour Ogee

    30 Hour Ogee

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    Ogees are my favorite (of the common clocks I see) to work on. Here’s a nice example I fixed for my friend Thomas. It had a series of small issues: The suspension spring was bent and kinked. I was able to just straighten it out. The escapement pallets had some wear in the form of…

  • Treadle Powered Watchmakers Lathe; or Becoming a Cyborg

    Treadle Powered Watchmakers Lathe; or Becoming a Cyborg

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    I bought a treadle or pedal powered watchmakers bench on facebook marketplace from a kind clockmaker. The bench did not come with a lathe, so I planned to use my electric powered watchmakers lathe – just without the electric motor. I drilled holes about a 1/4 inch into the table to recess the feet of…

  • Vice for Clock Wheels [Gear Wheels]

    Vice for Clock Wheels [Gear Wheels]

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    A very nice clockmaker showed me a tool I’d never seen before: a vice for holding clock wheels to easily work on them. The jaws of the vice are shaped perfectly to hold a wheel for easy access with files or polishing sticks: I set out making my own based off the pictures I took.…

  • Dickory Dickory Clock: Curing “Mouseitis”

    Dickory Dickory Clock: Curing “Mouseitis”

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    “Dickory Dickory dockThe mouse ran up the clockThe clock struck oneThe mouse sat stillThe Dickory Dickory clock was ill!” Here is a charming clock invented by Elmer Ellsworth Dungan around 1908 for his daughter who loved the nursery rhyme: “The Dickory Dickory Clock.” [at various times and places the rhyme has gone “hickory dickory,” “dickory…

  • Hand Tools Toolbox

    Hand Tools Toolbox

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    I have outgrown my tool roll so decided to make a dedicated toolbox for the main hand tools I use for repairing clocks. This is one post in a series about my various homemade toolboxes: so if that’s your thing, strap in! Those are all the tools I want to store and have easy access…

  • Watchmakers Lathe Toolbox

    Watchmakers Lathe Toolbox

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    I recently bought this lovely watchmakers lathe (and various attachments!) from a kind and generous man named Ray. Thanks again, Ray! Such a nice machine deserves a proper case. Here’s the lathe – an 8mm Marshall, which I set up for left-handed use – various chucks, collets, gravers, and the foot pedal. I started by…

  • Pre-WWI Cuckoo Clock with Articulated Wings

    Pre-WWI Cuckoo Clock with Articulated Wings

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    This is a cuckoo clock that was probably made between 1860 to 1914 in the Black Forrest in Germany (according to this). Aside from having cast bronze plates with a lyre pattern, the beautiful wooden bird that the mechanism puppets not only opens its beak but also spreads its wings! First I disassembled and cleaned…

  • Fusee: Grading on a Curve

    Fusee: Grading on a Curve

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    This is a clock with a fusee mechanism to regulate the power of the mainspring. Looking into the plates, we can see the fusee on the right as a sort of conical spindle (fusee derives from the latin word for spindle, fusus). When fully wound, the rope that’s on the barrel in the photo is…

  • Mid 19th c. Verge Clock in a Painting

    Mid 19th c. Verge Clock in a Painting

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    This is a clock from the 1850’s-1860’s that has quite a peculiar case – a painting! On a scene of the Rhine river, a painted clock tower holds a real working clock. The painting itself is quite discolored from time. It needs a good painting conservation, but I’m not the person for that job. The…

  • Comtoise Clock: Repair and Determining Geography

    Comtoise Clock: Repair and Determining Geography

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    This is what’s known as a Comtoise or Morbier grandfather clock. Let’s clean it up and get it ticking again, then we can discuss its name. Someone repainted the case. My instructor and I began to scrape the paint away, but that process is still ongoing. Here’s our first look at the movement. With a…