Just finished restoration of this very nice Vedette quartz desk/wall clock:
It is a fairly large clock measuring 25x11x9.5 cm. The French Vedette company was founded in 1920 and started making flip clocks from 1968. Vedette also produced this model under their Flash brand name and I have seen it rebranded as Junghans or Lambert. The model was produced with a Japanese Jeco tuning fork movement or, like this one, with a French quartz movement. The mechanism is exactly the same as my other Flash/Vedette clock, except that has the Jeco tuning fork movement and this one has the quartz movement.
I bought the clock as not working and there were indeed a few issues. The first issue was that the quartz movement was sometimes running but seemed underpowered. After opening it up and investigating it in detail I found the cause: the tiny magnet had become detached from the rotor gear. This was quickly solved with a little super glue.
The second issue was that the time could not be adjusted. This should be done by a thumb wheel at the back but the mechanism appeared to be completely stuck. The cause was in the slip wheel connection between the quartz movement and the clock mechanism had become stuck. After freeing this up by force and applying some oil it still required a lot of force to change the time. I then slightly bend the four arms of the spring in that slip wheel assembly to reduce the friction in the slip wheel. This has to be done with care since it needs to be strong enough such that the motor can move the clock but at the same time you want it light enough to allow the time to be set. I quite dislike this slip wheel mechanism as it means that it effectively means that adjusting the time will require at least double the force that is needed to move the tiles. This puts the two plastic gears that are uses to set the time at risk of slipping teeth and indeed that had already happened. A ratchet wheel mechanism like most Copal clocks use is a far better solution in my opinion.
A third issue was that the hours did not drop at the same time as the last minute tile dropped. Unlike most Copal mechanisms there is no exact synchronization. There are the usual springy tabs above both the hour and the minute tiles and there is an additional lever at the top of the hours to hold back the hours, but that lever is not triggered by the last til dropping but by a cam wheel with a drop-off step. This cam wheel wears over time, so it can get out of sync. I found though that by adjusting the tab above the minutes I could slightly change the time the minute drops and bring it back in sync. This worked surprisingly well. Although there is no enforced exact synchronization, I think that the bit of slack in the mechanism combined with the sudden release of pressure when the minute drops past the tab, causes the minute wheel to jump forward and that triggers the lever to drop of the step in the cam wheel at the same time.
Other than all that, I retro-brighted the case, removed minor scratches from the window and gave a good clean.
The clock runs fine now, really quiet most of the time, except when the hour drops. Then it produces a loud "clack", but at least you then know what time it is
It is a fairly large clock measuring 25x11x9.5 cm. The French Vedette company was founded in 1920 and started making flip clocks from 1968. Vedette also produced this model under their Flash brand name and I have seen it rebranded as Junghans or Lambert. The model was produced with a Japanese Jeco tuning fork movement or, like this one, with a French quartz movement. The mechanism is exactly the same as my other Flash/Vedette clock, except that has the Jeco tuning fork movement and this one has the quartz movement.
I bought the clock as not working and there were indeed a few issues. The first issue was that the quartz movement was sometimes running but seemed underpowered. After opening it up and investigating it in detail I found the cause: the tiny magnet had become detached from the rotor gear. This was quickly solved with a little super glue.
The second issue was that the time could not be adjusted. This should be done by a thumb wheel at the back but the mechanism appeared to be completely stuck. The cause was in the slip wheel connection between the quartz movement and the clock mechanism had become stuck. After freeing this up by force and applying some oil it still required a lot of force to change the time. I then slightly bend the four arms of the spring in that slip wheel assembly to reduce the friction in the slip wheel. This has to be done with care since it needs to be strong enough such that the motor can move the clock but at the same time you want it light enough to allow the time to be set. I quite dislike this slip wheel mechanism as it means that it effectively means that adjusting the time will require at least double the force that is needed to move the tiles. This puts the two plastic gears that are uses to set the time at risk of slipping teeth and indeed that had already happened. A ratchet wheel mechanism like most Copal clocks use is a far better solution in my opinion.
A third issue was that the hours did not drop at the same time as the last minute tile dropped. Unlike most Copal mechanisms there is no exact synchronization. There are the usual springy tabs above both the hour and the minute tiles and there is an additional lever at the top of the hours to hold back the hours, but that lever is not triggered by the last til dropping but by a cam wheel with a drop-off step. This cam wheel wears over time, so it can get out of sync. I found though that by adjusting the tab above the minutes I could slightly change the time the minute drops and bring it back in sync. This worked surprisingly well. Although there is no enforced exact synchronization, I think that the bit of slack in the mechanism combined with the sudden release of pressure when the minute drops past the tab, causes the minute wheel to jump forward and that triggers the lever to drop of the step in the cam wheel at the same time.
Other than all that, I retro-brighted the case, removed minor scratches from the window and gave a good clean.
The clock runs fine now, really quiet most of the time, except when the hour drops. Then it produces a loud "clack", but at least you then know what time it is
Comment