I can fully appreciate the amount of skill involved here. I'm currently on a journey to make a clock from scratch using traditional clockmaker's methods. I started from pretty much zero knowledge of even basic machining, let alone specific clock and watch work. I'm a couple years in now (working in my spare time between work and family obligations), and I can repair most types of issues with clocks and many watches. But I'm not quite tooled up and practiced in making the gears yet. That's the most major stumbling block currently to my ability to make a traditional clock completely from scratch.
One of my very vague goals is to build a clock, from scratch, without looking anything up.
It wouldn't have to look like a wall clock; just something that keeps 24-hour time within reasonable tolerances.
(It's been impossible to avoid knowledge of all clockmaking stuff, but I still avoid watching videos on how clocks are made. This is probably going to be something I do once the child is in college!)
This person's build is amazing! Mostly photos, but still super cool to see how "from scratch" it is - if you're expecting "bought a few components from Swiss companies" then, yeah, it's not that!
I submitted this a week ago and sadly it sank without trace (poor choice of posting time I suspect), so I'm trying again. I have no affiliation with the builder.
> bought a few components from Swiss companies
I know what you're referring to and it is exactly what I thought of immediately.
Thanks for pointing out that this is not that!
Thank you for this, it's amazing!
Almost everyone that's not already a large company is buying components.
The only truly independent watchmaker I've ever heard of machining absolutely every component is Masahiro Kikuno.
Even the main spring? For some of the components it seems like a significant sacrifice in quality to make it yourself. I appreciate people can make their own, but I also think the obsession some folks have with in house movements is misplaced.
Right. Even George Daniels bought mainsprings and hairsprings (along with sapphire crystals and dial engraving, probably rose engine work?) for his 25 handmade watches.
> In total he (George Daniels) created 25 handmade watches which were completely made by himself (23 pocket watches and 2 wristwatches) other than the crystal, the mainspring, the engraving of the dials and the hairspring. One pocket watch remains incomplete and is not included in this total number of pocket watches produced by George Daniels.
Even Valerii Danevych used a metal spring ...
https://www.ahci.ch/members/valerii-danevych/
https://www.keepthetime.com/blog/valerii-danevych-wooden-wat...
In case you haven't seen it before, my absolutely favorite watch resource:
I love this article so much. Demystified so much about how watches work.
If you liked this you might enjoy this series of video interviews with George Daniels, inventor of the coaxial escapement; he also made watches by hand:
Photo log:
https://imgur.com/a/making-mechanical-watch-VmYL7qF
This part blew my mind:
"All the screws were hand made."
This really is a watch made from scratch.
https://imgur.com/a/making-mechanical-watch-VmYL7qF link direct to the gallery.
This is the kind of people we need to reboot our industrial civilization after the nuclear war. Send him to our New Zealand doomsday bunker.
He's going to feel real foolish when he finds out his phone had the time on it all along.