1952 Buick clock fix

I've done a few of these, so I figured I'd post a how-to in case it helps anybody here. Just did a New Haven clock this afternoon.

If your Buick's clock isn't working, obviously you're going to check the fuse first...usually a small 5/8"x1/4" glass fuse in the panel. If it's there and not blown, and you are getting 6V at the clock terminal, here's a way that could get it working quickly. Remove the two 3/8" nuts from behind the dash panel and the power terminal and remove the clock. Use a set of needlenose pliers to straighten the crimps around the rear of the clock face bezel and remove the 2 Phillips screws from the rear of the clock housing and separate these parts until you have the guts of the clock exposed. Note how everything goes back together, there might be an inner index mark and there is a tab which folds back into a slot for reference.

1. Locate the squarish winding arm and move it counter-clockwise...this winds the clock. If it starts working, great! Proceed to the next step. If not...use some very light oil sparingly everywhere you see a pivot point. Locate the oscillator (a wheel which moves back and forth) and give it a light push. If you cocked the winding arm, then it should start rocking back and forth. Maybe for only a few rocks. Put a little clockwise pressure on the winding arm while the oscillator is rocking and just sit there until it winds down. This will work the oil into the mechanism. Repeat until the oscillator works on it's own...takes roughly two minutes to wind down. Might take a few wind-ups and run-downs to free everything up. Don't go crazy oiling it, just have some patience.

2. If you look at the winding arm, you'll see when it runs down it has a contact which touches another contact connected to a solenoid at the rear of the mechanism (circled in photo; green circle is the winding arm contact). This closes the circuit for the solenoid to re-cock the winding arm. It is probably a little blackened, which indicates that the battery was left to run down...eventually there wasn't enough juice to re-cock the arm all the way so it just rattled and sparked until the battery completely died. So there will be some carbon buildup on these contacts. Take a jewelers file and gently drag it across both contacts until they are shiny. Test the clock one last time by cocking the winding arm and pushing the oscillator...let it run down and re-assemble everything in the reverse order.

3. Disconnect the negative terminal of your battery...re-install the clock and connect the wire to the clock terminal. Make sure all doors are shut (no dome light), accessories are off and follow the owners manual instructions regarding touching the cable to the terminal first etc. You should here the winding arm "thunk" and the clock start ticking...if you get a "thunk" and no ticking just reach up behind the dash and tap the side of the clock; it should start ticking right away (sometimes the oil takes some time to fully work into everything).

This is how I've always done it and no guarantee to work, but 90% of the time it has for me in the past.

Hi,

I repaired auto clocks when I was in high school and repaired hundreds, if not thousands, of auto clocks. Your Buick clock is likely a Borg or Westclox. Either way, your best hope for a reliable repair is cleaning and oiling.

Krinkov58 is right on the money. But I would add the following suggestions:

1. Use mineral spirits and a mascara brush to clean the clock movement before oiling. Also, a strip of cardboard can be used to slide under the gears to clean the ring of dirt that you'll see around each pivot. That's exactly what we used in the clock shop. You want to dissolve and remove gunked-up oil from the pivots and any debris that may be on the gear teeth.

2. Most oils turn gooey over time. Do not use 3-in-1 or sewing machine oil: they are gunk waiting to set up. You can get clock oil at areksmurrayclock.com or google "Nye Oil" for sources including amazon.com. Both are stable and do not set up to goop/glop/gorp. Apply just enough oil to form a meniscus ring around the shaft at each pivot point. Also apply a droplet of oil to the escapement verge--a double hook-like thing that the oscillator knocks back and forth (that's what makes the "ticking" of the clock.). You can apply the oil with a flattened length of solder with a tiny amount of oil at its end--it really works well. Do not oil the gear teeth.

Cleanliness is absolutely essential for these clocks. The moving parts have no momentum: as with all tick-tock clocks, they actually completely stop and then re-start at every half-swing of the "oscillator" (balance wheel). The winding of the mainspring occurs about every two minutes after which the main spring runs down until the contacts come together and the solenoid energizes to extend the winding arm.

Be sure the circuit is fused--the solenoids had a habit of burning up if the ratchet on the winding arm is worn and repeatedly skips. If that's the case, your clock will buzz at you.

Who've thought that skills from an after-school job from 1965 would come in handy in 2015?

--Tom

I forgot to add the cleaning part, thanks Tom! It's a New Haven but Buick used Borg as well.

It's also a good idea not to try and blow the dust out...more often than not, you're going to blow a ton of dust onto the interior of the gauge glass. Which will then be a bear to clean because it can only pivot so far on the time/speed adjustment peg. Removing the peg is just making more work for yourself.

Great write up guys! Thanks!!

Pete and Shadetree should put this in the Bugle.

I imagine it spans a lot of years.

Very good writeups that mirror my method. The only hard thing on a 55 where the winding stem goes through the glass is removing the knob so you can clean the glass and touch up the face and hands. This is usually not a problem on one that has been installed inside a protected car, but units from swap meets, junk yards have the knob frozen to the stem.

Willie

I know I'm reviving an old thread, but this information is extremely valuable and I'm thankful for the knowledge gained on these forums. My contact points were stuck, but after a few winds and some light oil, my clock is ticking!

Great advice , going to give it a try , will post outcome 

cheers

pilgrim

I too had used this thread when getting my 54 clock ticking again.

Any advice for those of us that have converted to 12v? Would it damage the clock to hook it up directly to the 12v system? Could I just add a resistor in series to bring the voltage down?

Started , however my clock is a Borg , Feel silly asking but not sure which is the squarish winding arm referred to in first post. 

Cheers 

dum and dummer

On 6/29/2017 at 1:19 PM, biodegraded said:

Any advice for those of us that have converted to 12v? Would it damage the clock to hook it up directly to the 12v system? Could I just add a resistor in series to bring the voltage down?

The momentary 12v would probably hurt it less than a dying battery.  To get the proper resistor, you would need to know the amp draw and plug into Ohm's Law.  A constant voltage regulator like Ford used on their gauges for many years might work if it can handle the amp draw.

Anybody going into their clocks please take good high res pictures.  As someone above noted, this would make a good Bugle tech article and pictures would help clarify and answer some questions. 

5 hours ago, Pilgrim65 said:

Started , however my clock is a Borg , Feel silly asking but not sure which is the squarish winding arm referred to in first post. 

Cheers 

dum and drummer 

The winding arm is the large metal plate at the bottom that sits on top of the copper coil. Rotate it counter clockwise and see if it runs. I'd take pictures but I just put the dash pad back on. 

I found two bottles of Nye "Porpoise Jaw" oil in my father's stash. Could this possibly still be good for oiling clocks? It must be close to 100 years old.....

What could be causing my clock fuse to be burning out?   I go through the restart procedure, disconnecting the battery, replace fuse, etc., and it will work for months.  But then the fuse will just fry.

Sticking contact points I think would be the only thing to cause enough current draw.

Again

On 7/2/2017 at 1:10 PM, MrEarl said:

Anybody going into their clocks please take good high res pictures.  As someone above noted, this would make a good Bugle tech article and pictures would help clarify and answer some questions. 

Hello, I just disassembled one of these clocks from a 1955 Buick. I did everything as krinkov58 described. The oc oscillator worked fine with the square winding arm wound up smoothly. I repeated the operation several times. Everything seemed to be fine. However, as soon as I put it under power ( I tried 6 or 12 volts ) unfortunately nothing happened. Under power it does not work. What could be the problem ? ( I have cleaned the contact points ) What can be done with it ? Hope someone can help. Thanks

A fault in the copper winding under the points. 

Thanks for the reply John, how can I measure the coil? Should I measure at 6 or 12 volts? 1955 is marked on the clock case. 

Sorry, I cannot answer that question with reliable information.  But for the one I actually saw myself, the visible strand at the end was broken. 

Thanks for your fast reply.

New to the Forum and I realize this is a year old post, but I'll add some useful info for future viewings.

I've restored a clock on a 1954 Oldsmobile Super 88. It seems that there were two suppliers of clocks for these GM cars. One from Westclox (light bulb mounts from the back) and one from Borg Warner (light bulb mounts from the side). I've got the Westclox. It has 2 electromagnet coils. If functional, each will measure about 3 ohms and together will measure 6 ohms (they are wired in series). I used QD Electronic Cleaner from NAPA (WAY safer on any plastic bits) with the directional tube on it to only concentrate the cleaner solvent only on the pivots and gears that are gunked with old oil or whatever. Don't spray anything on the hair spring. I immediately used canned air with a direction nozzle to blow off the solvent before it evaporates to help blow out any loosened grime. The clock might struggle to work at this point (if it was working before) since most/all old lubricant has been removed. I followed up with Horace Whitlock's Synthetic Clock Oil (you can find it on Amazon, with two "needle/pin" applicators). You just dip the pin into the oil and touch the pin to the hole on the outside of the plates where each pivot pin rotates. The pin will look dry, but there is oil on it and it you hold it vertical, you can see the oil start to form into a drop on the tip. LESS IS MORE. If there are some pivot holes you can't get to from the outside, apply to the inside of the pivot but be careful to not get ANY oil on anything but the pivot holes. Don't get any on the gears and DONT GET ANY on the hairspring (that will change the timing of the clock as dust accumulates on that spring from the oil. There should be a pivot or two on the winding mechanism, including a small "spring release" system designed to snap the points together quickly just before the clock mechanism would have slowly bring them together (which would cause arcing/carbon on the points).

To polish/clean the points, I superglued a little square of 600 grit emory cloth to a small wooden shish kabob skewer to reach in there and clean those up.

Once hooked back up to a 12V source (I've got a variable DC power supply, but most folks can just use a spare car battery), you might find that the clock doesn't want to run. You'll need to gently push the balance wheel to get it going several times (it took about 15 minutes of doing this on mine) to help that new oil work itself into the pivot holes. If all is well, it should take off and keep running. I'd let it run for a least a day, before reassembling. You'll want to watch that balance wheel to make sure it looks like it goes back and forth at a steady rate. I could tell on mine that (before doing all the above) that the balance wheel and clock were running as if operational, but I could definitely tell that the balance wheel was slowing down slightly and then would speed back up. If it does that after all the above, you've got more work to do (either things didn't get fully cleaned or oiled properly.

Hope this helps someone else! My clock is running like new!

Welcome!  Always great to add new info to the hive.