Packing and sending clocks to avoid transit damage – how to do it properly

When you send a wall or long case clock, or even a mantle clock there are a few rules to obey if you want the thing to turn up working when it is upacked. The most important thing is to unwind the clock. To to see how to do this follow this link. If you dont unwind the clock and the clock loosens up in transit from vibration or knocks then the lynch pins holding the plates together can fall out. The end result of this is probably easier to explain with a mataphor. Imagine you had a safety pin connecting the two sides of yoru rib cage togther. Releasiing it will result in the ejection of your inards. This, in the case of the clock, happens rather violently and often causes serious damage to the coggs themselves see below where the bar courousel has lost some of its spiggots.

I redrilled the holes in inserted new rods by the way – the clock is back to its excellent functioning self. The blue ring highlights the corousel and its stantion bars taken out for replacement. You cannot do this without a high precision thick drill and I was using a cobalt .3mm bit. If you mess up the positioning of the bars the whole clock will cease to function so do be careful if you are attempting this yourself.

Coggrepair

The other really important thing to do when transporting a clock is to remove the pendulum. Even if you cant see its fixing you can still lift it which should be enough to un-mount it from its hanging point. If you dont do this then two things will happen during transport.

  1. The clock will not function on a flat surface or vertial wall mount. The anchor escapement will need resetting befor you can hear it tick tock again,
  2. If the pendulum is loose it its case it will bounce around and possible damage the clock mechanism as well as almost certainly breaking the leaf spring its supposed to hang on.

If you have a clock you would like repaired thats come to you as a box of bits just give me a ring!.

Clock on people.

Justin

Oh – heres the clock it came out of. An absolute corker. American turn of the century with a movement that moved me!. Really nice one.Ansonia Clock Repair