POTD- PROJECT OF THE DAY: What Did You Make In Your Shop Today?

[davek181]

I feel ya! We were given an old 400 day clock by my wife's niece at our wedding. Had the usual abuses a 400 day clock gets over time. I've just about got it rebuilt, I'm just having trouble timing the escapement correctly....

I find it quite ironic that fixing and testing a clock takes so much time, especially these long running ones. Not like working on a car or motorcycle where the test drive takes just minutes. On a 400 day clock I like to see them run a month or two before calling it a viable working machine. People tell me I should sell them, but they don't realize that the place you put the clock has to be very solid and level, and you may further have to level the clock and maybe reset the pendulum balls to keep time once moved. You can't just cart it home and set it on a crooked shelf and have it run. They are very relaxing to watch run, however.
Are you having trouble setting the beat, or the escapement teeth? I bough a beat amplifier that you attach to the clock near the escapement and you can hear the actual movement of the escapement, or ticking as the balls reverse motion. You then twist ever so slightly the torsion spring holder to get the beat to be even with the ball movement on each reversal. again it takes "time" and a light touch.
The escapement teeth or gear adjusting takes more time and patience than I want to give. I have one clock that needs that so far and it has gone to the back of the line for possible repair. It runs for several days then trips up on one tooth and stops. It is too bad it has that problem as it is one of my favorite designs with painted posts and face that make it more unique.
Welcome to the clock disease family. I know a few more people that suffer from it too.

 

[dkemppai]

I find it quite ironic that fixing and testing a clock takes so much time, especially these long running ones.

LOL! Funny that clocks are now the topic of discussion. My new project just arrived yesterday...

 

[great white]

I find it quite ironic that fixing and testing a clock takes so much time, especially these long running ones. Not like working on a car or motorcycle where the test drive takes just minutes. On a 400 day clock I like to see them run a month or two before calling it a viable working machine. People tell me I should sell them, but they don't realize that the place you put the clock has to be very solid and level, and you may further have to level the clock and maybe reset the pendulum balls to keep time once moved. You can't just cart it home and set it on a crooked shelf and have it run. They are very relaxing to watch run, however.
Are you having trouble setting the beat, or the escapement teeth? I bough a beat amplifier that you attach to the clock near the escapement and you can hear the actual movement of the escapement, or ticking as the balls reverse motion. You then twist ever so slightly the torsion spring holder to get the beat to be even with the ball movement on each reversal. again it takes "time" and a light touch.
The escapement teeth or gear adjusting takes more time and patience than I want to give. I have one clock that needs that so far and it has gone to the back of the line for possible repair. It runs for several days then trips up on one tooth and stops. It is too bad it has that problem as it is one of my favorite designs with painted posts and face that make it more unique.
Welcome to the clock disease family. I know a few more people that suffer from it too.

Mine had a damaged escapement pivot so I had to install one from a parts clock (same clock, too neglected to salvage).
The escapement on my model has adjustable pallets and the replacement didn’t run right when installed. It either wasn’t adjusted to where my original pallets were or someone has messed with them in the past sometime.
So I’m doing the back and forth dance with trying to get the pallets set properly. Clock runs for about 5 mins and then the pendulum just doesn’t have the energy to trip the escapement and the whole smash just stops.
Clock has been cleaned, oiled and adjusted otherwise so I’m pretty sure the main problem is in the pallets. New suspension spring installed IAW the horolovar book for my model.
I may tear it all down again and clean/lubricate the main spring again. I’ve read a few posts on nascm about these clocks not having a lot of power to put into the mech and having the mainspring properly cleaned and oiled is crucial.

 

[davek181]

I think the main source of friction in these is the mainspring gumming up. I made a crude but effective tool for unwinding and rewinding the spring to get it in and out of the drum. Do not try playing with the mainspring if you do not have a way to contain it, lots of kinetic energy there to take your fingers off. I would automatically oil and clean the spring on the clock first thing except that in order to get to it you have the clock all disassembled so you might as well go all the way. So instead I try light cleaning and oiling first and resetting the beat. I think I have all my easy ones done so I keep putting off the harder ones till later.
I use a synthetic clock oil anymore after seeing how well synth works in cars these days.

 

[dkemppai]

Not necessarily machine work, though I do have a jewelers lathe if needed. I do have a clock disease apparently. Not just any clock, but the 400 day clocks made in Germany in the last century. They have to be mechanical, not battery operated. I got these going and wound up in April, they have been running since then. Been trying to get the pendulum balls set since then to get them all to keep time, you can see they are all fairly close now.
My office looks like a ball clock junkyard with the others I have yet to fix. finding spare time to tear into them is hard. To tear one down and clean, lube and replace the torsion spring if needed takes several hours, but we don't dare time our projects, do we?

So, in the video, there's a best of show trophy with a pair of pistons on it... ...makes me curious what that's for...

 

[davek181]

I own an import repair shop and that particular trophy is for a project car that we assembled. I like the power and mileage you get from the VW diesels, especially the common rail version. I always wanted to put that engine in something else but no one built a harness or ECU to accommodate that so I made my own harness and with help from a tuner that specializes in those cars were were able to make it run standalone.
As a test bed we put it in the back of a 68 Beetle that had been cut into a flatbed at one time. The bed was long gone and it was real easy to stick the engine in and test it on the road.
Well the engine is pretty well perfected and still in the test bed. It is driven often as a daily driver, but we tow it to the dragstrip occasionally and run it there. The car weighs 1700 lbs and has according to the tuners dyno, more than 180 horsepower and more than 380 ft.lb of torque at the wheels. It turns the same times as the dedicated race camaros and novas and generates a lot of interest and smiles.
Here is a video of a random run against a dedicated race car. Old Ford Falcon body Stripped and strait axle and small block on the 4th of July weekend.

A comment of note to the fossil fuel lovers, we beat a Tesla in eliminations.

 

[BGHansen]

I changed the hose, bleed the clutch and weld up the bracket for the charcoal canister, install everything and took it back to him.

Ah, back to welding on Lada Nivas! I recall you running at least a kilometer of wire on your car; I'm sure you have the process down at this point! Nice fix there. If you move to Michigan, please let me know. We could use a craftsman of your talents nearer by!

Bruce

 

[extropic]

I own an import repair shop and that particular trophy is for a project car that we assembled. I like the power and mileage you get from the VW diesels, especially the common rail version. I always wanted to put that engine in something else but no one built a harness or ECU to accommodate that so I made my own harness and with help from a tuner that specializes in those cars were were able to make it run standalone.
As a test bed we put it in the back of a 68 Beetle that had been cut into a flatbed at one time. The bed was long gone and it was real easy to stick the engine in and test it on the road.
Well the engine is pretty well perfected and still in the test bed. It is driven often as a daily driver, but we tow it to the dragstrip occasionally and run it there. The car weighs 1700 lbs and has according to the tuners dyno, more than 180 horsepower and more than 380 ft.lb of torque at the wheels. It turns the same times as the dedicated race camaros and novas and generates a lot of interest and smiles.
Here is a video of a random run against a dedicated race car. Old Ford Falcon body Stripped and strait axle and small block on the 4th of July weekend.

A comment of note to the fossil fuel lovers, we beat a Tesla in eliminations.

I like your discussion of the VW diesels. It looks like it was a beautiful day at the track.

However, at 1.8+MB per second, you video is a bit rich for my slow & metered net connection. I wonder if there is a way for you to post videos that aren't such high res?

 

[davek181]

I would be glad to post slower videos if I knew how. I am not a member of the younger generation that can do anything with a phone. I thought I did pretty good even getting it off my Iphone to be able to post at all. The only way I have been able to do that is to email myself a copy and save it, then load the saved file to the site.
Maybe I could email you a copy? PM me if you want that and I will try.

Edit: Got an MP4 converter, think these will open for everyone now.

 

[Just for fun]

I'm of no help on the video thing.