Troubleshooting Uneven Pendulum Clock Movement: Leveling, Adjustment, Temperature & Humidity

Here is the patient:

Apparently he remembers the interwar period, if not earlier, but I am not sure about the dates.

The problem is uneven gait. Sometimes it goes well and sometimes it is a minute or two late a day. After adjusting the length of the pendulum, you can start to rush.
The clock is perfectly level, on average wound up once a week. The temperature in the room is 18-22C, humidity is 50-60%. The only thing it is exposed to is the vibration of the wall when the door to the garden closes with more force (the one on the right).
Gravity doesn't play a trick either, because another shuttle ticks in the room above (from 1954 - the date is stamped there) and requires a minute adjustment every two months.
The movement was cleaned a few years ago by a watchmaker, but if necessary, I can clean it myself again, because there are no watchmakers in Scotland.
What to pay attention to, what to use to lubricate / preserve the mechanism?

A rather vile conductive mechanism . It's not Becker or Junghans. I suspect that the pivots and sockets are made - especially the pivots of the anchor and the escapement wheel. Of course, it will not hurt to lubricate it - with oil for sewing machines. Disassemble the escapement and "let" the mechanism after lubrication. That is, lock the escapement wheel, wind the spring and unlock it until the spring is fully unscrewed.

Thanks, I'll try what you do.

Well, in my childhood, after my technical school class, I ran to my father's friend - a watchmaker and "apprenticed" with him ... Hence my knowledge of the subject. Sometimes I will also repair a mechanical clock myself.

I am renewing the old clock and what I noticed is that cleaning should be as you described, but twice, i.e. after the treatment as you described, rinsing with a degreasing paraffin (it would be good if mechanics use to degrease brake discs) I would have any dry old oil mixed with rinse with dust or cobwebs and only then oil it again.
These paintwork, after cleaning, break off and transfer to different parts of the mechanism, or even seal the spring itself, so it does not develop uniformly.
Such old oil can sometimes dry like varnish, especially when someone has used the wrong oil.

Once upon a time, I had to revive a soggy mechanical clock mechanism without disassembling it. Well, I used the "method" of boiling. I put the whole mechanism in a larger pot and just boiled it. Then, after it dries nicely, I smeared it all, especially the springs. I did a similar maneuver later with the cassette player mechanism from the car. Some kids (I think) put something toffee-like in there.

And the clock works to this day as if what.

Romulus7874 wrote:

Once upon a time, I had to revive a soggy mechanical clock mechanism without disassembling it. Well, I used the "method" of boiling. I put the whole mechanism in a larger pot and just boiled it. Then, after it dries nicely, I smeared it all, especially the springs. I did a similar maneuver later with the cassette player mechanism from the car. Some kids (I think) put something toffee-like in there.

And the clock works to this day as if what.

Half an hour of cooking in water with the addition of Louis and a little ammonia is the old method of watchmakers.Then such a warm mechanism is rinsed in gasoline, and then well dried, and then lubricated, and with such steel / brass connections gear oils (brown) are the best, not none of the vaseline machine (colorless).
You can use thin oil for gearboxes, it is not allowed to give it too much, preferably dip a sharp needle in oil and then touch the pin socket, this micro drop is enough, the excess oil inhibits the work of the gears depending on the spring tension, and sticks to it dust.

Some window cleaners have ammonia on the label - you can cook them freely, or use ultrasounds to clean the clock mechanisms.
The original watchmaker's fluid for cleaning the mechanisms is a mixture of water, soap and ammonia.

Quote:

Aleksander Sulikowski he came from an old, bourgeois Krakow family. He inherited from his father a watchmaker's shop, which was founded in 1858. The company operating in Krakow at 1 Grodzka Street enjoyed a great reputation. At the Sulikowski plant, he ran a store for pocket watches, pendulum watches, French clocks and alarm clocks, and also dealt with repairs. Aleksander Sulikowski was an active activist in Krakow's industrial societies - he was the president of the Craft Credit Association, and he also sat on the city council. He died in Kraków in 1910 at the age of 50.

This watch is quite unique and valuable - at auctions it reaches PLN 15,000 - so don't spoil it, it could have been made in 1885-1890
A, Sulikowski was a representative of the Swiss brand OMEGA after 1900, and developed several patents for this company.

These clocks are not hung on a spirit level but on an ear, the swipe of a pendulum Tick Tock - they should sound in the ear the same time.
Check if you have a weight stuck under the minute hand in this white part, these mechanisms required a well-balanced minute hand and an hour hand.

wada wrote:

This watch is quite unique and valuable - at auctions it reaches PLN 15,000 - so don't spoil it, it could have been made in 1885-1890

Thanks, I'll try. After talking with my family, I received photos dated 1918 and 1935, where the clock was displayed outside the house, so in fact its age is 100+ years.

wada wrote:

These clocks are not hung on a spirit level but on the ear, the swipe of the pendulum Tik / Tak - they should sound on the ear the same time.
Check if you have a weight stuck under the minute hand in this white part, these mechanisms required a well-balanced minute hand and an hour hand.

Yes, the minute hand is well balanced. There is a metal friction clutch between the gear of the hands and the mechanism, so without balancing it would be impossible. The mechanism is removed, it is in good condition, the gears are without visible signs of wear. Only some elements have a large axial play (considering the dimensions of the mechanism), but it does not look like wear, but rather deliberate operation. I used hot water rinse and lubrication.

Should only the tips be lubricated, i.e. the seat points in the crank, and should the gears run dry, or should the gears be lightly lubricated?

As for car oils, gear oils are usually denser, have viscosity classes of 75-90, which may be too viscous at room temperatures. On the other hand, synthetic engine oils are much rarer, maybe they would be better suited?

The teeth of the wheels in the clocks are never lubricated.

Read on the watchmaking forum.

zdzicho44 wrote:

Read on the watchmaking forum.

Exactly.

My father did not see him lubricate the brass / brass connections, when a brass one worked with a steel one, he gave a micro-drop for a few teeth on a steel one - he was driving a needle soaked in oil. He always preferred natural oils, and as little as possible, so this density did not interfere, and to these large mechanisms he gave gear oil, which is used in lathes, and it was very rare. And for 60 years he has revived the clocks a lot, for various museums, Ossolineum and private persons, and at home I still have a dozen fully functioning antiques, in which a large amount of parts was made extra.

wada wrote:

zdzicho44 wrote:

Read on the watchmaking forum.

Exactly.

My father did not see him lubricate the brass / brass connections, when a brass one worked with a steel one, he gave a micro-drop for a few teeth on a steel one - he was driving a needle soaked in oil. He always preferred natural oils, and as little as possible, so this density did not interfere, and to these large mechanisms he gave gear oil, which is used in lathes, and it was very rare. And for 60 years he has revived the clocks a lot, for various museums, Ossolineum and private persons, and at home I still have a dozen fully functioning antiques, in which a large amount of parts was made extra.

This lathe oil used to be called spindle oil.
To this day, these oils are used, only under different names, but it is just a thin oil and I think that the same is still used to lubricate the bed of the lathe after work and cleaning of chips. Its parameters are similar to the so-called oil. 3 in 1, which is slightly denser than the WD40.
By the way, I would like to point out that there is such a thing as oil drying time, which is very clearly among the oils used in dyeing.
Nevertheless, all oils have a "degree of drying up", and although a given oil does not belong to the category of drying up, each oil "dries up".
If it is not a direct drying process, such as, for example, varnish, then each one undergoes thickening, or the reverse process of cracking, i.e. breaking larger-complex particles on the straight, so the opposite of this is the merging of smaller particles into larger, and probably the best known there is such a process taking place in fuel oils, i.e. diesel, which, after years of storage, combines into more complex fractions until it finally becomes useless as a diesel fuel.
I once bought a lathe that looked like someone had flooded a bed of tar.
It turned out that the lathe had been out of use for over 50 years, and the oils that were used to lubricate the bed simply rotted to such an extent that their consistency resembled tar. After washing them with acetone, it turned out that the lathe from 1937 had almost new, little-used beds, and a detailed check of the origin of the lathe showed that it was used by the Royal Navy, from which it went to private hands during the surplus and survived almost intact, unused but lubricated in a private garage.

Machine oils are produced in various viscosity versions. From L-AN10 to L-AN150. link1, link2.
L-AN10 is actually almost like water.

I found a bottle of this oil from my dad and he writes:
Gear oil
For precision machines and mechanisms

The following are listed: closed-circuit and pressure-cycle lathe gears, precise mechanisms, clocks ...

oops from 1978, a rare amber color, and very slippery to the touch, and hard to wash off your fingers.

The same oil is used for sewing machines.

Bone oil or petroleum jelly is used for sewing machines, so that it can be washed off if the fabric is dirty.

zdzicho44 wrote:

Bone oil or petroleum jelly is used for sewing machines, so that it can be washed off if the fabric is dirty.

Exactly
And the vaseline ones have a poor glide and dry quickly - they become sticky, rubbery.

Bone oil is good for precision mechanisms, but has the disadvantage that it oxidizes. Its working time is about 6 months. Synthetic oils are the most durable.

The mechanisms should be equipped with oils for the low-speed mechanisms.
Eg.
Moebius 8000/4 Natural oil for mechanical watches
Application:
- anchor pallet stones
- idler wheels
- metabolic fingers
- gears
parameters
working temperature: from -15 ° C to 80 ° C
viscosity in cSt:
0 ° / 20 ° / 50 °
280/95/29

Moebius 8030 Natural oil for alarm clock mechanisms
Application:
- alarm clock anchors palettes
- idlers and gears for alarm clocks, wall clocks and standing clocks
parameters
working temperature: from -18 ° C to 80 ° C
viscosity in cSt:
0 ° / 20 ° / 50 °
440/115/31

Just by the viscosity, we can see that you can't use different oils without damaging the mechanisms.

I look at the above entries and leave it as this clock survived the century without modern petrochemicals
The clock has been cleaned, lubricated with machine oil and so far it works perfectly.

Thank you for the entries, I consider the topic closed.