Antique and Vintage Clocks

Schatz and Sohne, the maker of this pretty little 8-day carriage clock may not have considered that one day their carriage clocks would require servicing. Did they make a throw-away clock? We’ll see.

Many were sold and typically gifted to family, friends, and business associates. Over the years they have either been tossed out, found their way to antique shops/flea markets, sold to people like me or sat on a shelf never to run again. Yet, they are nice looking clocks.

Does the beginning of this blog sound familiar? If you are a regular reader you will note that I wrote about this clock a few weeks ago. Not happy the first time, I decided to tackle the movement a second time hoping for a better result. My approach is to give every movement my best effort and up to this point I have lost very few patients so, I was not going to allow this one to get the best of me.

My initial efforts to fix the clock produced a result that was no better than when I got it. It ran about 4 days and after servicing I was unable to improve on the running time.

Was it worn? Everything looked very good except for the second wheel (middle plate) bushing hole which was very badly worn, not surprising since the second wheel accepts the full force of the main wheel.

The thin brass plates don’t help since they exacerbate wear. A new bushing was installed and it was a good fit, worked perfectly but was very close to the edge of the plate.

During the first run-through, I thought I had nailed it. It should have run for 8 days. It did not.

However, in that first servicing, I did not clean the mainspring.

This time the mainspring came out of the barrel. It was not an easy task to extract it as the barrel is very small, 35mm in diameter, and too tiny for my Olie Baker spring winder (why I did not tackle it in the first place). Compare the barrel size to the winding key in the next photo.

Once the barrel cap was off, and the winding arbour removed I snagged the mainspring in the centre with a pair of needle-nosed pliers and pulled it from the barrel. Gloves are necessary as you never know how much force a mainspring will have once released from any barrel.

It was dirty but was that enough to affect the running of the clock? Will servicing the mainspring improve things? Hmm!

While the mainspring was out of its barrel I gave it a good cleaning followed by a wipe-down with Keystone mainspring oil. Back in it goes. Easy enough to take out but very frustrating to put back into the barrel. A few curse words and some encouragement and the spring found its way into the barrel.

It will be tested without the case and dial attached. So far it looks good but it has run for only a few hours.

Will it run for 8 days?

2 weeks days later

Servicing the mainsprings might have given me the 8 days I was seeking but that might not have been possible without fine-tuning the hairspring escapement which I believe contributed equally to a better run time. An adjusting screw on the escape wheel allows for fine-tuning but I had to rely on trial and error to find the sweet spot. Success in the end.

My intention was never to make this clock a daily runner but it is nice to have something that runs according to its original design. My cost was one bushing and, of course, my time.

It will be displayed, and run occasionally. Oh, and about that mainspring; I cannot imagine anyone with arthritic hands trying to wind it once per week, that mainspring is so powerful.

These are very cute little carriage clocks and they can be successfully repaired but I would certainly not put a great deal of money into servicing one unless, of course, it has deep sentimental value.