Completed fly

IMG_20150222_135813

The flies now have arms and are essentially complete. The exact sizes are estimates, based on clocks seen in person and online. It may be that some tweaking of the paddles is needed further down the line to correctly control the striking. We would still like to see more turret clocks in person to make this kind of educated guesswork more accurate.

Due to the position of other components on the outside of the frame the striking fly has a crank in it. The chiming fly only needed a 1/4 inch offset to give sufficient clearance. It is normal for the two flies to be different, they aren’t both made cranked just for the sake of matching.

The arms are made from 1/4 inch steel, welded together rather than a single piece (otherwise quite a large, but narrow, plate would have been needed). The blades of the fly are made from approx 0.064 inch thick steel. Pawls have been made to engage with the previously made ratchet, with springs attached to the arms.

The arms have been sprayed in red oxide to prevent corrosion, this is not the intended final colour. We do plan to fully repaint the clock once complete but the final colour hasn’t been decided yet. Current thinking is a dark green (in which case probably British Racing Green). We don’t know what the original colour would have been, quite possibly the same blue as it came but that’s not certain.

Barrel ratchet pawl & spring

IMG_20150205_122430

It’s been pretty cold again here so progress had been limited for the last couple of weeks, but another small job has been completed. All three of the barrel ratchet pawls were missing from the clock, along with their springs, and the pin to attach the pawl on the going train (the pins on the other trains did more than just hold the pawl so had been left on). When the clock was directly motor driven theses were no longer needed.

Replacement parts had to be made. The springs are riveted to a small block that bolts to two threaded holes on the wheel (3BA thread), as you can see in the pictures.

When purchased the barrel and the wheel were stuck together, I was worried they might have done something nasty to join them. However,  with dismantling and cleaning, they have freed off and now work nicely as they should.