Thread: Clayton Boyer Clocks

Thanks for the pics...great work there. I too would love to make one of claytons clocks. How long did it take you to make?

Dean.

Hi Dean
I estimate about 80 hours as I had to join and size all the timber, I found the cost of delivery of Finish Baltic Ply from Melb to Wauchope prohibitive ($165)
So I made it in solid timber and hoped for no warping on the large wheels.
The Celebration clock is progressing slowly, have cut the major wheels and frames. Here's hoping

Cheers

Jon

Hi, I would like to get into making one of these timber geared clocks. Any advice on what sort of scroll saw I should be looking at, and blades etc for it. I read that a lot of the plans suggest ply in various thicknesses, but is the ply from Bunnings suitable?.. A lot of the ply I see there looks pretty low grade. So if I was to use solid timber, do I have to make a lot of triangular type joints so I get end grain all the way around the clock.

Any advice to get me started would be appreciated

Paul

WOW! and WOW! and WOW!

Hi Paul

For the pictured clock (my first) I used solid timber, joining huon pine and cedar where necessary to make larger flat planks to cut gears and frames, however I did get some warpage and had to recut a number of them. I used a Jet scrollsaw a pretty ratty one at that but it was OK if careful. My attempt at Clayton's Celebration Clock was a disaster. I cut the large frames from joined solid timber but they all warped and the large gears were likewise affected. I then used marine ply from Bunnings (rubbish quality) and it too warped slightly and created problems down the track. After hours and hours of adjusting and re-aligning I could not get the clock to beat properly, every time I looked at it, it would stop. It seemed to me the spring was not powerful enough to drive the escape wheel with sufficient force to keep the pallets and pendulum moving.
In the end I scrapped the clock idea, adjusted the plans and mounted a 30 RPM DC high torque motor and it is now a marble machine, raising balls and dropping one very few seconds into the races that empty to ring bells and make a lot of noise and activity. It looks quite effective!!!

Good luck with your build

Cheers

Jon

Hi Jon, And thanks for your reply and extensive comments. So you found it not a good idea to use solid timber and then the Bunnings ply didn't help your situation much. Do you think a more expensive scroll saw would assist. Any advice on what you would do different if there was a next time,?

Thanks, Paul