Three Junk Clocks - Fixed and Flipped

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. We collect so many clocks that we've actually got a clock guy! This guy is a fantastic packer too. Just look at the care he takes in packing clocks. They were mailed to me all bubble wrapped up and stuffed with newspaper to keep the glass safe during transport.

All three movements were verified junk and the bodies 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. Two of the clock bodies were usable, but this one was completely damaged.

The three movements were rusty, but basically just needed some TLC.

There were no missing parts and the most time consuming part was removing rust.

I carefully removed the rust using a synthetic paint brush and a Japanese brand of clock movement rust remover.

I labeled all of the stuck parts.

All of the movements eventually balanced out with a few adjustments.

Next is oiling and this is the most important part. It is important to only use clock oil. Don't let the price of it keep you from buying it either, because it is expensive!

One clock was too busted up to just paint. For the door, 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. I primed and painted it using black acrylic paint.

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.

I really like how this turned out!

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.

I really like this color!

The color is Turner's Pistachio Green, but I think they should change the name to '100% baby blue'! I was really disappointed at first with this color, because it looks nothing like the color they had displayed in the shop. It has grown on me though.

Again, I sanded the body and then primed and painted with acrylic black paint.

I waxed the body with Annie Sloan Dark Wax too.

Junk to keepers!

This was a really fun project.