Chimney Insert Replacement Clock

We bought a house in 2020 and have been working hard to fix it all up. The previous owners had a wood stove installed that we had to remove (they are no longer allowed in our area due to air quality issues), and the old inserts to the chimney were sticking out of the wall. Sure, I could have just removed and added a sheetrock patch, but the texture of our wall is difficult to match. As I've stared at this eyesore for a few months, I got to thinking that it was the perfect size and location for a clock - and we needed one in the living room anyways! All it took was a little 3D printing, spray paint and some reused items to get it looking much better.

In this project I will describe how you can reuse/reclaim a chimney insert to make it into a clock and beautify your living room.

This project didn't really require much in the way of tools or supplies. You'll need the following to do exactly like I did mine, but to be honest your insert will likely differ as mine is old and they are all different - as always, use what you have when possible!

• Old chimney insert vanity ring
• Scrap of flat metal - thin steel works best
• A clock mechanism - I highly recommend a "high torque" version for a clock of this size - I purchased this one and really like it
• 12 gauge bicycle spokes
• Numbers - I purchased and 3D printed these numbers from Cults 3D for an art deco look, there are many free 3D printed numbers out there or you can buy some pre-made ones too
• 3D printed clock hand attachments or large clock hands
• Spray paint
• Tin snips
• Drill and drill bits
• JB Weld or rivets
• E6000 or similar adhesive
• Hammer
• Center punch
• (Optional) hammer drill and Tapcon screws
• Scrap of insulation

I removed the ring first to kind of lay things out and get a feel for the scale and size of what I would need to print, purchase and make, then screwed it back on so I didn't have a gaping hole in my wall for weeks. When you are ready to commit you'll want to take out the sleeve insert and remove the ring from the wall. The sleeve on mine was lightly mortared into the concrete blocks of the chimney - some minor chisel and hammer work freed it right up to pull out, and the ring was just screwed into the wall with three screws and is a separate piece from the sleeve. There was a bit of insulation around the insert that I just took out and threw away as I was going to replace with a scrap of insulation from another project to fill the whole gap.

As you can see above, if you have a wood stove GET IT CLEANED REGULARLY! If we had tried to use this stove, it may have burned down the house - all elements of the pipe were almost completely clogged, and you can see some melting of the creosote where it almost caught fire. Holy cow this is dangerous.

If you are 3D printing numbers, you should get a feel for how big they need to be and what color will work best. My wife and I couldn't agree on gold vs white so we made a compromise - I printed the 12, 3, 6 and 9 in gold and the rest in white - it turned out very nice! I paid for and downloaded these art deco numbers from Cults 3D - I like them a lot. You can print whatever number style matches your decor or preferences best. I used PLA and 0.2mm layer height.

For the clock hands, I could have found some that worked okay for the size of this clock, but it was difficult to find any that I liked or that matched the measurements of the clock diameter. I used to work in a bike shop and love bikes, so really wanted to use bicycle spokes as the hands. To do this, I designed the attached bits to fit around the hour hand shaft and minute hand shaft, and allow for some bicycle spokes to thread into the hole. Print at the highest resolution your printer will achieve, smaller layer heights are better. I printed in PLA, slightly warmed them with a hot air gun, and threaded the spokes right in - no glue needed.

These are meant for the specific clock mechanism I purchased - you may need to modify for your purposes, as they come in different sizes. They are designed for 12 gauge spokes. Clip the spokes down so that the bent end is removed and they are the length you desire for your clock's diameter. One will be short for the hour hand, the other longer for the minute hand.

I just purchased a 12" by 24" sheet of steel from the hardware store. The hole in the middle of the insert was about 10" in diameter, so I cut the sheet of metal in half using tin snips. The duck bill ones (Wiss M7) are great for this purpose - they easily cut a sheet of metal straight across without bending or warping it. One half of the sheet will be used to fill the hole to insert the clock mechanism, and I used the other half to cover the hole in the chimney to prevent air drafts, pests, etc. from getting in the wall.

I had to remove some metal "ears" from the back of the ring - not terribly sure what they are for. They were just spot-welded on there, so I drilled the back of the weld off a bit, took a chisel and popped off the ears, then ground down the remaining bump of metal so the sheet would sit flush on the back of the ring. The added benefit of grinding these was a good surface to attach JB Weld to - since the metal is galvanized, removing some of that increases adhesion. I used quick weld so I didn't have to wait too long. I just mixed up a bit, put it on the ground down spots (8 of them) and set the whole thing on a chunk of wood. I added some weight to the top to compress it all so the metals would stick together well.

Then, I found the center of the whole assembly - using a large framing square, I lined it up with the attachment holes which are at 90 degrees from each other. I drew a line in the middle, switch to the other set of holes and drew another. Where the two lines meet of this cross is the center. I used a drift punch to mark it, then drilled a hole slightly larger than the shaft for the clock assembly.

Very simply, spray paint the whole assembly. I used Rustoleum Rusty Metal Primer (my favorite spray paint primer) and some flat black paint. I put the whole thing up on a block to make painting the edges an easier task and avoid paint runs there.

To paint the hands white, I hung them off of a piece of wire and also primed with the same primer. Then did a coat of white enamel.

Add all of the 3D printed numbers to the clock face once the paint is dry. I used E6000 for this - I very much like the tubes of that used for jewelry making, they come with metal tips that are handy to control the flow of it for precision work like this.

To be honest, I just eyeballed the numbers for placement on the clock. The 12, 3, 6 and 9 lined up with the attachment holes, then I just laid out the other numbers as closely evenly spaced as possible in between. I'm pretty accurate with eyeballing stuff like this, but you can also try and measure and mark with chalk the 30 degree spacing between each number if you'd like.

I put the clock hands on the appropriate shaft, and added just a drop of superglue to ensure they wouldn't slip.

I used the extra scrap of metal to fill the hole in the wall to keep out cold air and pests. I pre-drilled four holes at the corners of the metal, using a drift punch to keep the drill from walking. Then I used that as a template for my hammer drill to create holes in the blocks for some Tapcon concrete screws. To insulate, I just found some scraps of insulation from another project and put them in there - one layer of rigid foam and another of fiberglass batting.

I added some drywall anchors to where the screws would attach so that when I need to replace the battery it's easy to do. Once I screwed it back on the wall, it was easy to adjust the time by manually pushing the minute hand. It's been up for a while and keeping time nicely, and makes a great replacement for the gross old chimney insert. Since I used a C cell battery mechanism, it should be quite a while until I have to replace the battery, and changing the time for daylight savings should be simple to do using the manual method of moving the hands.

I hope this Instructable has been informative or inspiring, keep on making!