Do your grandfather clock weights refuse to fall? Do not worry; here are the guidelines below on how to handle some pendulum (weight) issues on your grandfather clock.
Grandfather Clock Weights and Functions
In a grandfather clock, the weight on the left side is responsible for powering the hour strike, the weight on the right side is responsible for powering the ¼ hour chimes (it is the heaviest of all), while the weight in the center powers the pendulum, which is responsible for regulating the time indicated by the hour and minute hands.
Whenever the pendulum swings, the weight of the pendulum drops slightly. The clock chimes whenever the minute hand gets to the quarter hour; this makes the weight at the right hand to lower slightly, causing a lever to strip. At this point, the clock strikes the correct hour, which results in the weight on the left dropping.
No Weights Drop:
In every quarter hour, the time train of the clock makes the chime to strike; this causes the strike weight on the left side to be positioned on top of the hour strike. What this means is that without the center pendulum (weight) dropping, the strike and chime weights will not also drop.
Therefore, if your weight does not drop, one of the first things you should do is to make the pendulum swing again.
The Right and Left Weights Refuse to Drop:
In this case, the hands of the clock are moving, and the pendulum is swinging, but the clock is not chiming. When this happens, the hour strike will not be active because if the chime is not operational, the hour strike will not be operational also.
The first thing to check to right this anomaly is to see whether the chime lever on the dial of the grandfather clock is in the “chimes off” position. If it is in the “chime off” position, reset it to be centered properly over the chime setting.
The next step is to remove the panel at the right-hand-side of your grandfather clock and ensure that the steel retard bar of the chime has not been lowered onto the chime hammers as such situation could cause the chimes to stop operating. However, not all clocks have this feature.
The Left Weight Refused to Drop:
In this case, the hour strike is not operating, but the quarter-hour chime and the time chime are operational. The first thing to do is to remove the panel at the left-hand-side of your grandfather clock and ensure that the steel retard bar of the chime has not been lowered onto the chime hammers as such situation could cause the chimes to stop operating. The next thing is to check whether the lever is operating properly.
I hope you were able to solve your grandfather clock problem with the above information. If not, then you need the services of professionals like Time And Chime. We are Pittsburgh specialists in cuckoo clock repair, Seth Thomas grandfather clock repair, pocket watch repair and anything that has to do with a timepiece. Our grandfather clock repair in Pittsburgh is affordable and professional.
If your grandfather clock weights refuse to fall, do no worry, Time And Chime will fix it for you at a fraction of the cost.
You can contact us for support or call us at (877) 573-6644.