Steve's Cuckoo Clocks
1948 - 1952 Cuckoo Clock Mfg. Company.
This clock has a very interesting history to how these were imported to the USA from Germany right after WWII. I acquired this clock in mid 2014 and had to replace one bellow, re-oil/clean it, and re-time the Cuckoo snail (was striking 2 when it should have been striking 1). Runs great and has a wonderful Cuckoo sound! Before Photoshop restore - severely chipped
After digital restore - not too bad!
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Early 1970's. Manufacturer unknown, but it does have a Lotscher (Regula) movement in it and a Swiss Cuendet music box. Acquired this clock in mid-February 2015 and completed restore in early March. This one needed to be re-oiled and cleaned, some adjustment to the music box triggering and then only heavier weights (630 g) to run it properly.
Nuremburg Cathedral Clock - about 1965 February 2018 - Completed restoration of the outside of this clock. See before and after pictures. I was able to take hi-res pictures of the old finish (severely chipped), and literally Photoshop'ed them to make them look new again. Very tedious work - pixel by pixel. I then printed the images on printable thin veneer wood stock sheets from Cards of Wood, cut to size and glued onto the clock for the resulting after-images. Looks pretty good and still has a nice wood feel to it. I still need to do some repairs to the movement, it works, but stops ticking after about 15 minutes. April 2016 - My Mother-in-Law gave me this clock about two months ago. Mechanically it works about 90% - all except the little trumpet raising guys. But the paint and bottom border edging are in terrible condition. I came very close to throwing this in the trash but then I found out on the NAWCC this is a pretty rare clock. So I am in the (long) process of restoring this clock. Essentially, I took close up pictures of the three sides of the clock and I am slowly digitally restoring the "paint" in Photoshop. Then I am going to print the three sides on this special, very thin, wood veneer from this place in Michigan that I used for another project. Cut it to size and then glue them onto the clock. I've already tried a test piece of the wood veneer looks pretty good with the print. So right now I'm about 50% complete overall. |
Early 1970's. Manufacturer still unknown, but this has an Anton Schneider (Regula) movement in it and a Swiss Cuendet music box. Acquired this clock in later February 2015 and completed restore in early March 2015. This clock needed a new music box govenor trigger, re-oil/cleaning, and re-size the Cuckoo bird door wire to make it open/close correctly
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General:
General:
- It took me about 3 months time to master fixing these clocks; the work can be very intricate, time consuming and frustrating
- If you want to fix / work on these type of clocks - most of all have patience, it's not that difficult of work, but tedious
- Don't be afraid to tinker with it, if you ruin it, there is lots more for low cost to fix on eBay
- Do your homework - there is a lot of resources on how to fix and get Cuckoo Clocks working again on the Web
- Good place to start: Clockworks
- Good source for parts: Timesavers
- Excellent forum for clocks including Cuckoo clock help - NAWCC.org