Clocktime: John Fromanteel's Monumental Architectural Night Clock c1667, 03 the Movement

John Fromanteel - Monumental architectural ebony night mantle clock with painted dial of survey party and a tic-tac escapement.
Join Dr John C Taylor OBE from the Clocktime digital museum as he discusses the movement of John Fromanteel’s Monumental Architectural Night Clock, circa 1667.
Discover more about early and antique clocks and watches...
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And if I unlock the back, we can open it up and see the candles inside. At least a nod to health and safety is the brass plate to stop the back catching fire. So, opening the back door to see the back plate, the lovely lambrequin engraved Johannes Fromanteel Londini fecit. John Fromanteel of London made it. So, here you've got the very early example of another vertical bell arbor and the horizontal clapper going onto the bell. Very early feature and the very high up the train count wheel and you can hear the tic-tac escapement going tick-tack, tick-tack, tick-tack. It was thought that it would be a better escapement than the verge, but it never really caught on and very few clocks have these tic-tac escapements. So, with the bell off, you can see the clapper moving but of course it won't strike and then you can see the gears behind and the fly. And with the bell back on its stand it'll strike again, 7 o'clock and listen to the ring go on and on and on and on and on. There it goes, wonderful. And very confusing, the setup springs and clicks are at the bottom, so for an unwary person it's easy to imagine that that's where you wind the clock but of course it isn't, these are the barrels and the fuseés are higher up here. So, you have to wind the clock on these, these were just used for the original setup of the clock but it's very easy for an unwary person to wind the wrong squares. Then you need a clockmaker to sort it out. You can also see the little stay to mount the pendulum, if you're going to move the clock, just clicks in there and then the clock has got the pendulum locked and you can carry it round without damaging the tic-tac escapement.