your own wooden clock?
Yeah, me neither but apparently people do it.
A couple of years ago my buddy Rick Urschel
sent me a whole bunch of footage of him
building a wooden clock where he cut all the gears
and did everything by hand.
Absolutely awesome process, very tedious
and it took me this long to get around editing the footage
but it's finally done
and I got a little video here to show you
exactly what this process looks like.
Let's head over to Rick's shop and see how it's done.
(lively music)
Rick:Hi, my name's Rick Urschel aka Patty Chuck
and welcome to my woodshop.
This clock that I'm building is a gift for my daughter Eli
and although she's only eight months old,
I hope this is something I can pass on to her
when she eventually moves on and starts her own life.
The clock I'm going to build
was designed by a gentleman named Clayton Boyer.
The design of this clock is very forgiving
and has a great introduction
to the art of building wooden clocks.
(mellow music)
Marc:Each wheel begins as a drawing
that gets glued to a piece of plywood using spray adhesive.
All critical components
should be made from high quality plywood
for the sake of stability.
Rick is using a Mahogany ply
from aircraftspruce.com.
To cut the gears, the scroll saw is outfitted
with a 12 and a half tooth per inch, 5R blade.
For the inside cuts, a simple drilled hole
provides a starting point.
After cutting, the teeth can be cleaned up
using a sanding strip in the scroll saw.
After the wheel has been cut out,
the paper is removed using some naphtha.
The paper usually peels right off of the wood.
This is the escape wheel,
the part of the clock that gives it the ticking sound.
It's critical that the tips are crisp and concentric
by mounting the wheel on a shaft,
the tips can be sanded to perfect concentricity.
The cannon pinion receives a through hole
and a countersink.
To maintain concentricity,
the blank is taped to the table surface.
The larger countersink is drilled first
and the smaller through hole is drilled second.
(mellow music)
Some parts will receive a hole between two teeth
that holds then tap to create threads for a set screw.
(mellow music)
All the frame pieces are made out of
three quarter inch solid maple.
The parts are cut out the same way as the gears
using the provided templates.
A chisel is used to make a notch for the drive gear.
The one shaft support fits into a dado
on the front of the main frame.
A dado stack at the table saw
removes the material on either side of the shaft
and a dial caliper verifies that the support
is only a few thousands wider than a notch in the frame.
A few passes with some sandpaper
should produce a nice snug fit.
The drive gear assembly consists of the drive gear,
the pulley for the weight chord and the click gear.
The parts are glued together using a drill bit
to hold the parts in position while the glue dries.
The intermediate wheel assembly
consists of the intermediate wheel, a spacer
and the intermediate pinion.
The third wheel assembly consists of the third wheel,
a spacer and a third pinion.
The escape wheel assembly consists of the escape wheel,
a spacer and the escape pinion.
Small breast tubes are then inserted
into the assemblies using an arbor press.
The frame consists of eight parts.
Everything gets glued and clamped together
and screws are added through the back side
of the rear frame for extra support.
(mellow music)
That may seem like a lot of clamps
but you need to do whatever is necessary
to get good glue contact.
The rear vertical frame is then glued
to the main frame.
The brush shafts needs to be polished
before they're pressed into the rear vertical frame.
Using the drill press and some polishing compound,
the shafts take on a nice shine.
The shafts are then pressed into the frame
with an arbor press and a dead blow hammer where needed.
With the gears in place, it's time for fine tuning.
By spinning the gears manually,
the floss becomes obvious as the gears simply bind up.
A rotary tool is used to relieve some of the material
from the pinion teeth and then we can test again.
There's only a few teeth that bind up this time
so we'll use the rotary tool
to relieve the offending material.
When the gears turn freely, the fine tuning is done.
You can even blow on the gears
and they should turn freely.
The Pendulum Bob is made from three pieces of walnut.
The inner piece is cut to rough shape
and then glued to a backer.
This creates two pockets where led shot
can be added for extra weight.
A precut piece of walnut seals the deal.
Once the glue is dry, the Bob is cut to its final shape.
A two pound cut of shellac is applied
to the face of the gears,
taking care to get no finish on the gear teeth.
A total of three coats is applied.
With the clock dry assembled,
a four pound weight is added to test the clock's movement.
The clock will likely stop now and then as it breaks in
but the weight can be adjusted for optimal performance.
The clock hands are made from Purpleheart and Canarywood.
After rough cutting, the parts are glued together
and then shaped at the disk sander.
The center is then cut out of the scroll saw
for a decorative effect
and a rotary tool is used to further shape each hand.
The clock face is then cut from a sandwich
of maple and walnut.
The clock weight will be made from a steel tube
capped off with walnut.
The tube will be filled with led shot,
bring you this close to four pounds as possible.
The remaining clock parts we finished
with General Finishes Enduro-Var,
a high quality water based finish.
(mellow music)
Now it's time to hang the clock.
(mellow music)
Rick:The clock's been running pretty steady now
for about three weeks.
I had to make just a few minor adjustments to the pendulum
but its finally found its home
and this is now the second wind that we've been on
that the time has been just perfect.
It will ran about 26, 27 hours or so on a wind.
Every morning we get up, we wind the clock, yeah.
That's it.
Thanks a lot for coming on this journey with me
and I hope it's inspired you to try and make your own clock.
It is a very easy thing to do.
You really don't need a lot of tools.
All you need is a lot of patience.
Best of luck.
Want to say goodbye?
Say goodbye.
(mellow music)