Waterbury “Arion” Small Octagon Short Drop wall clock

A diminutive size, this clock was made around 1930 just a couple of years before the Waterbury Clock Company was placed in receivership. It is a solid oak case measuring 19 inches long by 12 inches wide, with a paper dial marked Waterbury, a black and gold pendulum aperture, and 8-day time-only movement. The bottom of the dial says, ” Made in the USA by Waterbury Clock Company”, Connecticut.

While the clock is a strong runner there are obvious issues concerning the paper dial and the lack of a brass bezel. The dial plate does not have to be changed out but the clock is in need of a brass bezel, hinge and convex glass. Although the style might be slightly different on a replacement bezel, it is clearly required to complete the look. I have decided to retain the paper dial as an exact replacement is impossible or so I have found so far in my research. Half of the paper dial has become unglued from the dial pan. Two-sided tape in three locations was the fix. I may touch up the numbers 7, 8, and 9. We`ll see.

RS Waterbury Octogon short drop (10) — Pendulum bob

The Waterbury Clock Company was incorporated in the city of Waterbury, Connecticut, on March 5, 1857. Up until the Great Depression Waterbury had been quite prosperous. But like so many companies, most of the profits lined the pockets of its Directors instead of being reinvested in new equipment and updated facilities thus hastening its rapid decline. In 1932 the company was bought and re-organized under the name Ingersoll-Waterbury.and in later years the company morphed into the Timex Corporation. If you peruse the Timex site today you will see a line of Timex watches called the Waterbury collection. Timex is certainly acknowledging a link to its past.

RS Waterbury Octogon short drop (8) — Instructions for the clock

The instructions came with the clock and I smiled when I read them. “The long hand is the minute hand and the short hand is the hour hand”.

A inexpensive acquisition and only a few dollars to add glass and a bezel to complete the clock.

February 14, 2016

Sessions Beveled Number 2 Re-assembly

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA — Refinished clock case

This clock has been sitting on my workbench for a couple of months. It is an attractive little Sessions tambour style mantel clock, very popular in the 1930s. I spent a little time refurbishing the case, have had good success making it look presentable compared to when it first arrived. The case was marred and it looked like it had been kicking around in a basement or a busy street (LOL) for a number of years. After a thorough ultrasonic cleaning and polishing of the pivots it is time to re-assemble the movement.

It was very inexpensive clock and a great one to hone my skills in clock repair and case restoration. One of my tasks was to use it for bushing practice but my Bergeon bushing machine is back ordered and it does not look like it will arrive until April. I really do not want to learn how to hand bush, I will leave that to the traditionalists. The bushings are in good shape and I am confident it will run but eventually it will need bushing work.

The first challenge after dis-assembly was to clean the movement and the springs. When I first pulled it out of the case, the time spring had completely let go as a result of a click failure. You can see the retracted spring in the photo below. Click failures are a common problem with Sessions movements. In fact, I have another Sessions Westminster chime clock with the same issue.

I cleaned and lubricated both springs. Everything went well until I tried to hook one of the springs to the winding arbor. After many tries I managed to massage the spring around the arbor with needle-nosed pliers and it finally hooked. The other spring was fine. Let’s hope it stays put and lets hope my click repair is successful.

The next photo shows everything in place on the bottom plate. You will see some strange looking wires which appear to be added to the movement but they are actually helper wires installed at the time the clock was made, essential to allow retraction / movement of some of the levers.

Getting the top plate on can be frustrating without the proper tool. One such tool is a pivot locator. It is a hooked device about 8 inches long that allows one to position the pivots into the bushings with minimal fuss.

Here is the assembled movement with the springs clamped for safety. You will notice the top plate appears to be dirty. In fact, this is some kind of lacquer residue. I am not into aesthetics and have chosen not to buff out the plates. A repair shop might for appearance-sake. The important things is that the mechanism is clean, which, of course, it is.

As I have others things on the go I have not tested this movement yet though I checked the action of the time side and the count wheel and they seem to be moving without restriction.

The next phase is testing and if necessary, minor adjustments.

Sessions Tambour – Beveled Number 2

This is a Sessions Tambour style clock that I have been working on for the past two months. I bought it as a non-working clock. As I said in a previous post it is a fairly attractive mantel clock featuring a mahogany finish with faux inlay just south of the dial. It was made in the late 1920s or early 1930s. The case is finsihed and now for the re-assembly of the movement after a good cleaning.

The clock has a few issues aside from the missing pendulum bob. Once the movement was out I inspected the click on the time side and sure enough it had slipped off the teeth. These clicks were poorly designed and often fail. However I think one for the reasons why the click failed was because the arbor hook detached from the spring somehow, I don’t know for sure. I feel that two are connected. I filed the click, gave the rivet a gentle bang with a hammer to set it more firmly in place and now it seems to work as it should.

I recently bought an Ollie Baker spring winder and this was it’s first test. I had a heck of a time getting the main wheel arbor to hook onto the spring and really had to muscle with the inner part of the spring to get the curvature just right so that it could hook. At first I thought that the hook was the problem but as you can see the hook looks fine. Then I thought the spring was the problem but as I said, perseverance paid off. User interface error I suppose.

As others have said that is one of the common frustrations of working with clocks. But in the end I managed to get it to hook. The two springs are coiled and secured and are now waiting to be put back onto the movement. But not today! One victory today is enough. I will keep the reader informed as to my further progress with this clock which I am determined to get working.

It all seems to be coming together although like most things worth doing, it takes time. Let me know what you think and if you have a chance I have a poll that you can respond to. Thanks.

January 13, 2016

Repair and Cleaning of Sessions Beveled Number 2

I did not pay much for this Sessions tambour style clock (circa 1927) though my first thought when I picked it up was that I paid a little too much, such was the work that awaited me. This was obviously a non-working clock when I received it and it did not take much to discover why. It also came without a key and a pendulum bob. Not a problem since I have an extra bob and a universal key set.

I suspected a problem when I first saw it advertised. When I finally picked it up I noticed that the strike side spring was fully wound while the time side was completely unwound.

A turn of the key on the time side told me that nothing was engaging . I suspected three things; a broken spring, broken click or unhooked spring. It turned out to be a broken click. Here it how I found the time side mainspring wheel (see photo below). The click engaged very poorly and ultimately slipped quite a bit making it impossible to wind. Sessions are great clocks but they have a dubious reputation for their click design and the clicks quite often fail over time.

and the repair.

The click was filed down and the rivet was made secure by tapping the back lightly with a ball pean hammer on a vice. Brass is pretty soft and easy to work with.

The clock was disassembled and the parts were first cleaned by hand and then placed in an ultrasonic cleaner. The bushing holes were pegged and the pivots were polished. I did not detect any serious bushing wear though at some time in the next year or two the clock will probably require some bushing work.

I test fit the movement but have not put on the top plate just yet since I am waiting for my spring winder to arrive.

The case was in poor shape and as mentioned in a previous post I stained, used steel wool and applied 3 clear coats to bring the case back to a presentable condition. I am pretty confident that once everything is all back together the clock should run nicely and be a fine addition to my collection.

November 12, 2015

Sessions Tambour Style clock

This is a Sessions Tambour style clock that, according to the label on the inside back access door is a Beveled Number 2. Seems like an odd name for a clock. It is a fairly attractive mantel clock featuring a mahogany finish with faux inlay just below the dial. It is a time and strike clock, two hammers striking on rods. I would put the date of manufacture at the late 1930s or early 1940s. I have 2 other Sessions clocks with a very similar movement so it looks very familiar. This one came without a pendulum bob so I will have to order one from Timesavers. I am not sure at this point whether the bob is a 2.3 oz or 3 oz so I will order both.

The clock has a few issues aside from the missing pendulum bob. I noticed right away that the time side arbor turned freely and therefore it was impossible to wind the time arbor as the click was not engaging the time spring teeth properly. Once the movement was out I inspected the click on the time side and sure enough it had slipped off the teeth.

This is a common problem with this type of movement and a repair is definitely in order. The movement itself is very oily and dirty having been sprayed with some sort of lubricant at one point in its life. There was back gunk (old caked oil) on some of the pivots but there was not as much play in the bushing holes than I would have expected. The spring issue probably arose early in its life. One thing which I first thought was an issue turns out not to be. As the photo shows there are helper wires between the escapement and the fly.

They keep the strike levers from bouncing and assure better operation of the striking mechanism. They are in factory installed condition.

The case was a little banged up. I did a little sanding with 0000 steel wool, removed dozens upon dozens of white paint drops, filled gouges in the veneer with a red chestnut stain and applied the same stain over the entire finish and it seems to pass for mahogany.

A little Brasso metal polish was applied to bring the shine up on the bezel and I Windexed the dial glass inside and out. The results, I think, are impressive. As a final stage I will apply a clear coat on the case.

Can I get this clock to work? I am convinced that if I can fix the time side click, give it a thorough cleaning, this clock will run fine for a long time.

November 1, 2015

Ansonia Octagonal Short drop “schoolhouse” clock

Ansonia Schoolhouse ClockClock — Ansonia Schoolhouse Clock

I have been thinking of expanding my collection of wall clocks lately after acquiring a good sampling of mantle and shelf clocks.

I picked up this clock not far from where I live. It is an Ansonia octagonal short drop commonly known as a schoolhouse clock. I am putting the date of manufacture at around the turn of the 20th century though I cannot quite pin down the year. The number 12 is stamped on the movement which could refer to the year “1912”, or even the month of a year. The letters “TT” are also on the movement. This is my first Ansonia clock.

The gentleman I bought it from told me that this clock has been in his family for over 50 years and “I never saw it running”, he says. He was in the process of liquidating his mother’s estate and was loath to give it up as it had been a favorite of hers. He also said that it came out of a schoolhouse in Ontario, Canada; where, he did not know. The case is in great shape though there are other minor issues. One, the face has had some paint applied around the minute / hour pipe presumably to hide stains incurred from years of oily fingers winding and adjusting the clock.

You can just barely make out the Ansonia trademark. The second issue is a missing bushing for the hour hand.

The bushing inserts into the hour hand hole to friction fit with the hour pipe / cannon. I suspect that the clock was not running was for this very reason. Someone thought the clock was broken. It is an easy fix and requires buying or fashioning a new bushing.

Curiously, there were pieces of rotted elastic band on the pendulum rod just below the suspension spring. I have no clue why. You can still see a bit of it in this photo.

Otherwise except for a little adjusting (bending of the crutch to get the beat right} the clock works well and has been ticking away for a day now. There is very little wear on the clock and no obvious bushing issues that I can see although I will have to take the movement out of its case for a further inspection and a thorough cleaning to determine what if anything needs fixing.

Much has been written about the Ansonia clock company. The company history can be found here. The Ansonia Clock Company went into receivership just before the stock market crashed in 1929, a foretelling of things to come, perhaps. The machinery and dies were sold to a Russian Company. A sad end to a glorious American company.

Postscript: I took the movement out of it’s case and found that the clock does indeed need 2-3 new bushings. The wear is not terrible and the clock runs fairly well but bushing work is in order. Once the new hour and minute hands arrive I will clean the movement, re-assemble the clock and display it until my bushing machine comes in the new year.

Nov 10th; new hands arrive in the mail. The hour hand has the required bushing and was an easy friction fit. Now looks and runs as it should.

October 26, 2015

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