Rosewood Seth Thomas (Thomaston) Ogee Clock - Part 2

Apparently I've forgotten all about this series (there will be at least 3, maybe 4 parts to this clock restoration), so here is an update on this clock (which is currently finished and running quite nicely).

The previous part 1 is here:
http://jcclocks.blogspot.ca/2016/02/rosewood-seth-thomas-thomaston-ogee.html

The only part of this clock that I had posted about so far was the restoration of the movement. This is a somewhat in-between to late model Seth Thomas ogee. It has a Thomaston label, but a Plymouth Hollow movement. I would guess that it's as late as the 1870s. This would mean that it would have a decal style glass (fairly detailed/printed). Probably flowers or a Victorian style scene. However, I wanted to install a somewhat earlier stenciled tablet. They are nicer to look at, and they look more convincing that buying a reproduction tablet from a supplier.

For this tablet I dug into my Fenn Stencil books and picked out a design that I've seen used on Seth Thomas clocks. I've seen this pattern on column and cornice clocks. It is also similar in style to a few other patterns of the period. The nice part of this specific pattern is that I had photos of a popular colour scheme for it which looked quite nice. Largely dusty grey and red.



A similar tablet in black and gold:



Two ogee clocks with the blue/gold/black theme:



This is more or less the exact tablet I wanted to copy (as far as colours go):



Different pattern, same colours:



I cut all my stencils from chemical-proof plastic. Anything that won't melt or dissolve in lacquer thinner. I have used thin plastic file folders as well as Mylar for this. This was actually a stencil that I had already cut a few years ago. Initially the size of the pattern was a bit smaller than I wanted, but I assumed it would look alright. I went ahead and stenciled the glass with bronze powders using my usual method (see Mirror Clock Project).



The finished glass didn't look TOO BAD, but I hated how the blue-grey turned out. It was far too blue, and too bright.



I decided to scrap it and restart. I took the glass out, stripped all the paint off, and I decided to enlarge the pattern also. These patterns are incredibly tedious and difficult to cut, so on something like this I actually only cut HALF the pattern, and I stencil it in 2 parts. All tiny dots are painted in freehand.



Stripping off all my hard work:



Here's the new stencil before cleanup. You can see some of the thin streaks of varnish across the glass. The arrows point to all the goof areas that need to be cleaned up. I use a toothpick to just scrub the glass clean in all these spots and to clean up any rough lines.



Before cleaning up (note centre of flower):



New bouquet stencil. You can probably see where a lot of the dots are missing (centre of flowers and ends of stems etc).



Bouquet and red border done. At this point I really didn't want to mess up the grey so I did over a dozen colour samples.



Here's the finished tablet. The gold pattern sort of disappears depending on the viewing angle, but it turned out beautifully and I'm very happy with it.

Mirror Clock Project - The Completed Dial

Here is the completed dial after small touch-ups, antiquing, and a clear topcoat.

I went fairly light with the antiquing, and the main areas that were darkened were: around the edges, and around the winding hole and centre hole. Also note how far from "white" the dial was painted. The dial is photographed over a sheet of white paper for comparison. It is much closer to grey. Also visible in these photos are the 3 filed reference notches on the dial edges.

Mirror Clock Project Part 6 - Painting the Dial

Unfortunately I didn't take many photos of the dial-painting process. For the most part few clockmakers seem to have the talent nor the desire to paint their own dials, which is a shame. The process is not overly complicated. Start with a drawing (you can cheat and print a stock image to actual size), transfer the drawing (you can use carbon paper, or simply rub pencil graphite on the back of the drawing), then ink it in with your choice of drawing tools. You can use ink pens, a fine drafting set and India ink, thinned black paint, or whatever combination suits your fancy.

The dial painting process started with deciding on the size, style, and layout of the numerals. Depending on the age and style of the clock, different numerals were used. Some 1850s clock dials had incredibly thin and tall Roman numerals, while others had small thicker ones. Others used Arabic numerals.

I started with life sized drawings to get a good preview of how each dial design might look. These are two of the designs I didn't use (I used the third).





For my dial, I simply used an inking pen, and painted the numerals with gloss black enamel. It's important to use a CORK BACKED RULER.



The design is transferred to the dial surface with graphite on the back as described above.



The dial in progress above (painted at the same time) was for this Gilbert clock:



Once everything is dry (and if you're using a waterproof ink and paint) the excess pencil can be washed off. You can NOT do this with India Ink. Water instantly dissolves India Ink (which is also why it needs a topcoat).

While the dial is now painted, it's not finished yet. It needs a clear coat, and possibly some antiquing (I'll experiment and see what I can do).

Comtoise Clock Restoration - Part 2 (Various Repairs)

This will be a long post with LOTS of photos. I will try to divide it into sections as best as I can.

DENT REPAIR

The brass front was one of my main concerns, and I began working on it almost immediately. I used a soft piece of leather, as well as hand pressure (the more you can repair with your fingers, the better) as well as various wooden tools. Items used were mainly popsickle sticks, and paint brush ends. Use a smoothing/rubbing action, and light pressure. You may need to work mainly from the back, but also from the front.

After about 45 minutes, I had this:



I went back to it a few more times to tweak more small details. Because it's such a busy pattern,it helps to hide a lot of the imperfections. Very tricky areas tend to be large flat spots and gentle curves.



The bob "as received". It doesn't look too bad in the photos, but it had several bumps around the edges, and the rays coming out from the ends of the hair were really buckled outwards compared to the rest.





The back on the bob, as well as the front brass dial surround are crimped in place. The crimping was very carefully lifted a little at a time, and as little as possible until the bob came apart.



I was surprised to see that the bob was actually made of three pieces, rather than just two. I had expected just a front and back, but there is also a steel dished front piece. It doesn't actually support or make contact with the front, so I assume it's merely for added weight and rigidity.



When I took this apart, I thought that this arrangement was odd, because the rod can't be pulled out from the top of the bob. I later found out that this might be a later repair, since normally the rods simply continue (as a flat bar) right into the rating nut.



After. Not perfect, but much better.



STRIPPING & RUST REMOVAL

Parts before stripping:



Parts during stripping. I expected the paint to be very difficult to remove, but it came off very easily. You can see that I had plastic wrap over the stripper (because I thought it might need to sit and work for a while), but I didn't even need it.



After stripping. Note that the bell looked quite good in the 'before' photos, but it was spray painted silver, and hiding lots of rust.





Following the stripping, the steel frame parts were given a good soaking and scrubbing in a muriatic acid bath. This is the first time I used full strength (32%) muriatic acid (hydrochloric acid) for rust removal. This is definitely something you must do outdoors, with heavy duty rubber gloves, eye protection, and a breathing mask. I did not soak the parts excessively long, but I removed about 90-95% of the rust. Some of the remainder was sanded off with fine sand paper. The bell and the bell stand were some of the worst pieces, along with the top and bottom frame plates.

METAL REPAIRS (Tabs)

The tabs for the door hinges and front panel were repaired, but I decided not to do the ones on the back panel because they might interfere with the action of the doors.

To make these repairs, I used pieces of spring steel (metal strapping or old clock springs make good material for this). Ideally you should use a strong "springy" steel since it will be strong. Mild steel may wear quickly or bend too easily.

I started by cutting simple rectangular sections, polishing the face to bright steel, and doing the same on the panels. It's CRUCIAL that you have clean bare metal.

Silver solder was used for a very strong repair. The plate was heated to red hot, and soldered leaving the rectangular tab sticking out a bit. The actual tiny tab was filed to shape after.

The first one gave me the most trouble, because I had not cleaned a large enough area on the plate, and I didn't have quite enough heat.



The next 3 turned out beautifully. You can see 2 blanks in the bottom of the photo.



Another "repair" was to darken some bright silver screws. These two screws held the back panel in place, and they are later replacements. They don't really show, but I did not like the bright shiny silver look, and I preferred not to paint them. I immediately reached for gun blue, but it had no effect on the metal. As it turns out, these were stainless steel.

Stainless steel can be tricky to colour/darken, but my friend Jim suggested that I might be able to heat it to red hot, and leave it cool. This turned out working fairly well. Not a perfect black or deep blue, but a dark grey, which is fine. You can see a before/after here:



ENAMEL DIAL REPAIR

The dial on this clock was surprisingly flimsy and fragile. I had expected a very hard and solid dial, but these were enameled onto very thin copper. Most of the strength is in the actual coating of enamel (fused glass). On this clock, there are 2 or 3 blows to the dial which have caused minimal damage to the front in the form of small chips and cracks, but on the back, several sections of the enamel have broken away.

In addition to this, the top mounting hole has been completely torn away.

Here are 2 photos of the dial 'before'. Most of the damage is to the centre hole, and the top mounting hole.





The first cleaning trick to try on enamel dials is a good bath in Polydent. You'll want to find a suitable container, and use multiple tablets. For a bath this size, 2 or 3 should be enough. The Polydent will help to pull dirt from the fine cracks. If your dial is a Vienna dial, however, you may want to take more care since the signatures on Vienna dials are not fired into the enamel like this one.



To repair the torn hole, I used thin brass shim stock, and JB Weld. It would be easy to solder brass and copper together, but the heat would destroy the enamel.





JB Weld was also used to fill-in the missing chunks of enamel on the back of the dial. JB Weld dries exceptionally hard, and should provide some much needed strength to the damaged areas. It also happens to match the uneven grey tones on the back, but it could also be painted if necessary.





Following this, the areas to be repaired were filled-in, then painted with white oil paint. The white is not an exact match, but most of these areas will not be seen.











The rest of the repairs were pretty straightforward. The panels and frame were painted gloss black, the bell was given a clear coat, and all the parts were cleaned and oiled.

Here were a few photos during the testing phase.











Other repairs I didn't mention included things like making new leather washers for the bell, repairing a worn out screw on the pendulum guide piece, scraping off the solder from the canon wheel and brass disc, lightly curving the hands to conform better to the dial, etc. I still need to acid-was the hammer (I forgot to do it), and for the hands, I would like to replace that hex nut (not original) with a traditional square nut. I also need to make a toothed brass disc to hide the square hour hand locking nut. I plan to get proper rope "washers" (or make some) for the weight lines, and fix the short pendulum rod (4" short). The clock will need a wooden wall shelf.

Final photos and interior mechanism details in Part 3.