Three Junk Clocks - Fixed and Flipped!
7 Materials
$40
2 Days
Easy
My lovely wife Mariko and I are clock collectors! We collect old Japanese mechanical movement box clocks and display them around our house. We've dedicated a hallway to our favorite clocks too. An entire hallway full of tick-tock clocks! Imagine the sound at the top of every hour! I actually need to stop them all if my daughter has friends sleep over, because they say the noises scare them at night.
Why clocks? I've always been fascinated by the movement in a windup clock. I have a lot of success fixing junk clocks too. I found three junk Aichi Super Eight clocks at an on-line auction and was able to fix all three movements. This post is about the fixed and flipped clocks. 
These are the junk clocks. They were mailed to me, so the seller stuffed the clocks with newspaper to keep the glass safe during transport.
These clocks were in pretty bad shape. It looks like they were left out in the rain. The wood holding the face on this one crumbled when I touched it with a screwdriver.
The three movements were all rusty, but basically just needed some TLC. Who is singing 'Waterfalls'?
I labeled the problems with the movements. The pictures on the bottom are the same movement.
Yucky! This body needed the most work.
These are the movements cleaned, oiled and running.
One door was too busted up to paint. I was able to save the side pieces of wood, but cut new pieces for the face and pendulum window. I glued on plastic cherry blossom beads for decoration and made leaves using epoxy clay. This is the door before it got painted.
The first clock! I used Jacobean Briwax on the new wood. I sanded the body and then primed and painted with acrylic black paint. I waxed the body with Annie Sloan Dark Wax.
The first clock! 
The second clock! That color is Turner's Green Army milk paint. I sanded the body and then primed and painted with acrylic black paint. I waxed the body with Annie Sloan Dark Wax too.
The second clock!
The third clock! The color is Turner's Pistachio Green, but I think they should change the name to '100% baby blue'! Again, I sanded the body and then primed and painted with acrylic black paint. I waxed the body with Annie Sloan Dark Wax too.
The third clock!
These are the finished clocks! All fixed and flipped. I'm going to hang them in my workshop.
Junk to keepers! I hope you liked my post. For more fun visit Bryan's Workshop on Instagram and Facebook.
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4 of 62 comments
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I love clocks 🙃especially at daylight savings time change ( ha ha) I can relate to the tick tocking at night. thanks for sharing
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LOL! We don't do daylight savings in Japan and I really miss it. It gets dark at like 4:30pm in the winter time.
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I have 2 black forests clocks that don't work. I asked a guy I know how much it would cost to get them working. He charges 600.00 just to open the click. Not Including cost of fixing? Have ideas I will grab them out of storage and send pics.
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I'd love to help! You should also consider looking around for another clock shop. I had to get a new mainspring and it was only about $100 for the mainspring and installation. You should be offered a free estimate.
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Frequently asked questions
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What did you do to make clocks run again? I wet an outdoor clock and does not work anymore
I have 2 black forests clocks that don't work. I asked a guy I know how much it would cost to get them working. He charges 600.00 just to open the click. Not Including cost of fixing? Have ideas I will grab them out of storage and send pics.
I have a mantel clock. The face became discolored from some cleaner. What could I use to get the face to be one color?