Lower Is Slower

Yes, I admit it, I have this fascination for clocks. 

As you may know, back in May 2018, I got a skeleton clock which I truly love.  However the fascination over the clock being able to ring out the hour gets rekindled every time I hear the bells at Town Hall go off.

The Town Hall clock has beautiful Westminster chimes.  They go off every quarter with a melody where the number of chime sets match the number of quarters that have passed and then the clock would strike out the time on the hour. 

Did I mention that I have a window seat on the 24th floor on a building diagonally across Town Hall?  So believe me, I hear it several times a day from Mondays to Fridays.  (Now I feel like one of Ivan Pavlov's dogs.)

Anyway, I checked out clocks online again.  Only the second hand clocks in MarketPlace and Gumtree seem to be within a reasonable price range.  I used the key words 'westminster chime,'  'chiming clock.', 'chime clock,' and 'cuckoo clock.'  After seeing what was popping up with these searches, I added 'mantle clock' to the searches.

At the onset, I was keen on finding one with the Westminster chime.  I had almost been able to get a mantle clock with Westminster chime for $30.  I even brought out the cash and added MacGyver to the conversation with the seller so he could pick it up for me.  However, the next morning, we saw that the ad was tagged as SOLD and the seller didn't reply to any of my messages from the night before.  MacGyver said I probably asked too many questions about the clock.  He said that when he advertises things for sale, he just wants the transaction over and done with.  He doesn't like to get hassled by too many questions form the buyer.  (Oops, that would be me asking about the product before making the commitment to purchase.)

My search continued. 

One Saturday morning, I saw a cuckoo clock get advertised for $50.  The ad had only been posted for 2 minutes and it looked like a real decent clock.  At the time, I was convinced I wanted a clock with Westminster chimes, and a cuckoo clock would not have that, so I did not respond to the ad.  However, after some thought, I figured that the cuckoo clock would provide me with the hourly ring I was looking for, and considering most of the mantle clocks with Westminter chimes being advertised cost more than $50 even if they were not working, perhaps this was the clock for me.   By the time I decided that I would settle for a clock that rang out the hour, the $50 cuckoo clock was no longer available.  (I guess it wasn't for me after all.)

I said to myself, if I am meant to find one, I will find one.

True enough, later in the day, I saw an ad in Gumtree for a mantel clock being sold for $20.  Keeps good time, the ad said, and it was not too far from our place.  I send out a text message keeping in mind MacGyver's "don't ask too many questions" tip.  I limited my message to asking where we could check out the clock and whether it chimes out the hour. I mentioned that if it chimes out the hour number, I would get the clock.  Fortunately, the seller responded promptly and by 4pm we were on our way to Lochinvar Parade.

The seller was working in the garage when we arrived.  They were renovating the place and he said the clock was inside the house. I followed him inside the house to see the clock.  The clock was right by the door.  He turned the minute hand to 12 and let me hear the clock strike.  He showed me the key and wound the clock.  The left keyhole is for the hourly chime, the right keyhole is for the time.  Always wind towards the face of the clock, he reminded me, and stop once it feels tight.  Do not overwind it.  He showed me the pendulum and gave me instructions on how to put it on.  He said it was best to remove the pendulum from the clock while in transit.  He mentioned that the pendulum speed would vary depending on the season and I would have to adjust the knob at the bottom as needed.  And then he gave me these words of wisdom, "Lower is slower".  (I like that.  It makes perfect sense and it is easy to remember.)

I asked him why he was selling such a thing of beauty and he said that his wife said he had too many clocks.  He pointed out the wall beside the door, then added that he had some more clocks inside the house.  I looked at wall and saw that he had two skeleton clocks similar to mine!   (Yes, indeed.  If he had more clocks inside the house in addition to the two skeleton clocks on the wall, he could certainly spare this mantel clock.  Lucky for me!) 

We brought the clock home and positioned it on the top shelf.  I installed the pendulum and tried to figure out how to get the chimes to synch with the time.  When the clock chimed nine times, I set the time to nine o'clock then waited until 9PM to restart the pendulum.  When the clock hit 10:00, it rang nine times.  (Huh?  Well that didn't work.)   I moved the hands around again, let the chimes go off several times, and based on my calculations, if I were to restart the pendulum at 12:00, I should be good to go.  I figured it would be easy enough to restart the clock at noon on Sunday.

It just so happened that I was still awake at midnight so I ran downstairs, restarted the pendulum, then went to sleep.

Tick-tock-tick-tock!

Much to my dismay, all throughout Sunday the chimes did not match the time.  In fact, MyGirl reported at 11:01 PM that she could have sworn she heard the clock ring 14 times! At midnight, she said she heard it ring 21 times!  (Could this clock be working on military time?  I thought I was mistaken when I thought I had counted 13 earlier that day but maybe I wasn't.)

On Monday morning, MyGirl sent us a video of the clock.  It rang six times when the clock face clearly showed 8:00.  (Yes, this clock was driving her crazy.)

Check out the exchange of text messages we had on Monday evening at 9:07 PM  

                  MyGirl:    clock rang 6 times

                  RD :         9:07 on the dot

                  me :         To keep everyone on their toes

                  GI :         "It's a feature not a bug"

When I got home, I adjusted the minute hand.  That much I could do.  I had yet to figure out how to get the chimes to call out the right number. 


I listened to the clock chime eight times at 11PM that evening.  The next morning, I heard it ring four times at 7:00, and five times at 8:00. So far so good, it was giving me the right time even and it was consistently ringing T-3.  (At least I could throw out the military time theory.)

I replied to GI's latest text to agree that it was a feature, not a bug. I wrote, "This is the olden version of a world clock. The face shows Sydney time but it chimes Manila time."   (I quickly got an "Okay, Mother" for that lame story.)


I knew it was only a matter of time before I got this clock to work properly. I was committed to this clock.  I had promised its former owner that would take good care of it.


On (Ash) Wednesday, I ended up going home early (well, earlier than usual) because I wasn't feeling well.  I adjusted the hour hand and hoped for the best.  Am happy to report that  by the time MacGyver came home, the clock was ticking away and chiming the right time.


(Addendum and disclaimer : The day after I finalized the draft of this post, my new clock decided to stop at 1AM.  When I attempted to get it up and running again, it opted to provide us with random number of chimes at different times of the day.  Yes, it even rang 15 times a couple of times.  We'll see how it goes.  I'm not giving up on this clock just yet.)