Thanks Graham and everyone else, This has been a very interesting and useful discussion! A couple of points to add: although the only energy input to the system is the

HI Grant, Here's a link to Grant's presentation on his Synchronome extracted from the latest EHG Zoom here in Australia last month. That's before his latest

Hi If materials like Delrin were available when the clock was made, it may have been chosen. When I purchased my clock it was missing the ruby on the gathering arm. Impossible to

I have found that the local craft shop has many varieties of glass bead including clear glass so have a search for suitable shops in your area. Kind regards Peter

There is a video of correct gathering jewel set up on clockdoc https://clockdoc.org/default.aspx?moid=58095 Eddy Odell

Perspex is quite a hard shiny surface and works well John

Dear John, Many thanks for the tip. A friend in fact kindly made made me a Delrin (engineering nylon) roller and it does work fine. I run it dry. I just wonder (maybe a superstition) whether the

I don’t have an extra glass backstop, but have successfully used perspex (very easy to buy a rod and to drill/machine) and works perfectly - looks like glass. John

For sideways location of the pendulum and the relationship of the gravity arm roller to the impulse ramp I use the very helpful 1982 set-up diagram of L Paton (detail extracts attached). I assume

One thing that has come our way in recent years is the ability to use a smartphone to video the operation of the mechanism as the gravity arm is unlatched. It only requires about 10 seconds of video

Howard, Basically, you need a lathe. You need to be able to rotate the arbor with its wheel at fairly high speed on a fixed axis, and JUST touch the tips of the teeth with a fixed tool. I say

Hi Ian Does topping off require any specialist equipment? Howard

Hi All, At the risk of "teaching my grandmother to suck eggs", it may be worth pointing out that the only source of input energy is the falling gravity arm. After that, everything else is draining

I would add that where the count wheel has been damaged it may be necessary to set the jewel slightly deeper so that it properly catches the lower teeth. This will mean that the higher teeth show some

Hi all, My introduction to synchronomes came when I helped a friend restore a genuine one that had some parts missing. I have since made my own pretty much from scratch after starting with only the A

Thank you Ian, Johnny and John, I have had a crash course in Synchronome setting recently, so I was across those things - but always useful to re-iterate! This clock is a mixture

Hi Grant, Further to what John said about the gathering jewel being clean and dry (which I fully endorse!), the glass back-stop roller should be similarly clean and dry. The gathering action of the

Hi John, Yep, all good. See note on jewel back surface roughness, no oil on front face. Grant

A few ideas. The jewel and countwheel teeth should run dry - NO oil. The teeth faces and slopes need to be very clean. The jewel should ‘just’ engage the tooth enough top pull it round - no

Dear All, I recently replaced my home-crafted gathering jewel arm with an after-market one - whereupon I could not get the clock to run; it was constantly losing power. This