The Craftmans Shop > General Crafts

Regulator Clock

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russ57:
Very nice, and thanks for the explanations as you go along...

-Russ

smiffy:
Thanks Russ .I know that clocks are not every ones cup of tea but they can be very interesting .
When you see how well thought out the designs are ,the people who designed them must have been quite remarkable.

I struggle to make them with modern tools ,the skill levels needed to make them on more basic machines is something else .

Even with modern lighting it is difficult to see what is going on inside the frames,how on earth did they manage with a candle '

I made a short video of its first run . I has taken me most of the day to set it up , The pallet arbour sits in eccentric bushes .
the pallets are adjustable via 2 screws ,one to spread them and one to tighten them .but by only a few thou

  To set it one pallet nib is coming out of contact with the escarpment half a tooth width before the other nib engages  it needs a combination of all 4 adjustments to get this and each adjustment affects the other. Its a bit like going around in circles
 
 
This is easier said than done as it can be difficult as the clearances are very fine  It is not helped by the fact that I am self taught in engineering. Some times  it is difficult to know what to adjust to get the required result

I also made the brass weight today , when I know the drive weight  I will fill it with the right amount of lead

Video  link   

Still need to silver the face and fit it . Then I will make a case

philf:
Hi Smiffy,

Very nice.

The escapement still needs some tinkering as there's still some recoil evident.

I have a few master clocks with deadbeat escapements and they are capable of excellent time keeping. They would be better if they weren't in my workshop in the cellar where the temperature varies a lot. (Not so much if I'm not working in there but I need the heating on to make it bearable in winter.)

Did you use commercial cutters for the wheels and pinions?

Phil.

smiffy:
Thanks for your comment . I realised that there was a slight recoil but was just pleased that the clock was running .
Most of the machining was straight forward but the escarpment I found quite taxing . I have only made recoil escarpments before and find them hard enough to get right

So today I striped the clock down and put the pallets in the depthing tool to adjust them . Half  a turn of the 8 ba adjusting tool makes a large difference to the clearance 

I refitted them and set the clock up again and made another video  .

Its very difficult to know which adjustment to make to alter the drop of the pallets without upsetting one of the other settings

 Its much better but still requires further work

As i said before I have no  training and this is the first regulator that I have made .I spent most of my working life as a agricultural engineer or working as a welder fitter on large excavators and HGVs . Its quite hard working on small parts when you have hands the size of dinner plates

I do have a few electrically impulsed regulators such as the  GPO   PO type 36 regulators made by Magneta

I do have wheel and pinion cutters made by Thorntons . Expensive but the very best quality .

Most of the brass  material came from the scrap yard and is of unknown grade and possible not the best , but is what I had.

The rest is either silver steel or gauge plate . The only other thing I brought was a piece of Invar for the pendulum  rod

All the machining was carried out on a Boxford AUD .I used direct division for the wheel cutting with spindle  mounted in a vertical slide on the cross slide and driven by a overhead pulley arrangement.

I have replaced that lathe with a Emco V10p with milling head but now cut wheels and pinnions on a Leinen lathe but  also have a Hemmingway pinion mill and Chronos type wheel engine both home made

philf:
Hi Smiffy.

That looks a lot better now.

Is that an IBM (or ITR) master clock in the background? I have two - one was the master clock from the factory where I worked, the other I picked up last year cheap off ebay. I also have a Synchronome which was taken out of the school where my wife worked. She spotted it in the head's office and mentioned I was interested in clocks and he gave it to me.

I started a skeleton clock a good few years ago and made some pinion cutters which worked well but I have yet to make the cutters for the wheels.

The cost of decent clock brass is frightening. The wrong type (e.g. CZ108) machines like sticky cheese - I've got loads of that!

Cheers.

Phil.

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