For whom the bell Tole's
Mitchell reached out a few months back. He was looking at a local auction in New Jersey and saw a clock that he liked.
It's called a Tole clock.
Tole comes from the French term/phrase "tole peinte de lac" which roughly translates to "painted tin."
Tole painting was the rage all through the 1800's when many everyday items like trays, utensils, coffeepots... even furniture, were decoratively painted in rich styles. Martha Stewart calls the painting style "folk art" but she's a heathen and is referring more to the American examples of Tole painting.
A subcategory of Tole was born in the design and painting of clocks. Typically these clocks are housed in large metal cases, decoratively painted and a with loop (called a "bow" in watch vernacular) on the top.
This Google search shows some good examples.
Here's a fine early French example at auction.
And here is a 4 minute NAWCC video that highlights Tole clocks and their history.
Early French examples are highly prized and can quickly go deep into 4-figure territory.
The example at our auction was listed as "not working" but Mitchell was doing some inspections of other items (speakers) at the auction and was able to take a number of pictures (including the one above).
Based on what he shared, your coast-to-coast horologist believed the movement to be legit (old) French and in very good shape and missing its pendulum.
Regardez.
Note the metal frame.
Also note, towards the top of the movement, the thin string looped through that rod.
It's a silk suspension movement, a style your correspondent knows well and is a strong indicator of the Tole clock's age.
By about 1860 or so silk suspensions in clock movements were replaced with some variant of the Brocot mechanism. Your horological essayist researched this extensively a few years ago and posted a brief chronology of the evolution from silk to Broc. With pictures and everything!
The metal case looked quite old but inside it the clock's movement looked extremely well maintained (it seemed remarkably clean).
From the auction site:
That looks like a classic, old, hand-painted case. The white porcelain dial, the shape of the hands, the time and strike movement. All of this points to real deal Tole.
Furthermore the clock was being offered from an estate auction of what was clearly, based on all the other items being offered, a wealthy collector of art objects.
If the only thing missing from the clock was the pendulum... clock geek here was interested.
Conferring with my handsome boy (man), and suspecting that most bidders would shy away from a "not working" clock, your deal-seeking correspondent decided to bid.
Mitch won his speakers and the Tole was had for a pittance. Shockingly low really.
Our bundle took a cross-country trip to Carmel Valley and landed on the kitchen table at Chez Rancho.
The dial has a few chips and cracks but otherwise, she's in stunningly good condition.
The movement is wonderfully clean and recently oiled. Someone took great care of this clock.
Another thing missing from this clock is a stamp on back plate indicating the length of the pendulum rod required for the movement.
French clocks typically have their pendulum lengths (in Pouces and Lignes) stamped on the lower part of their movement's back plate. Another area this researcher has deeply mined before.
In this case that 63 is a model number as it matches other stamped parts of the clock like the one found on its matching bezel.
Turns out, and especially with silk suspensions, getting a precise length of a pendulum is unnecessary. It can be cut and adjusted later. Your horologist estimated 6 inches would be in the ballpark.
Pre-ordered and arrived before the Tole itself was a replacement silk suspension pendulum. The amazing folks at Timesavers seem to have all things clock.
What is very important is getting a pendulum that designed to work specifically with silk suspensions as they require pendulums with very thin rods and light (small) bobs on the end.
Knowing that vertical space was limited inside the case, your local horologist did some math and estimated that the replacement pendulum rod would have to be cut down and re-bent so as to hook appropriately on the suspension thread.
After about a 4 inch haircut and some double pliers bending.
In the photo above see the brass rectangular block sitting on the bob?
It's a feature/component of silk suspension clocks. It's designed to maximize impact in the pendulum crutch fork while keeping the rest of the suspension rod thin and light.
You slide the block up the rod into the area where the rod sits in between the tines of the fork.
Here's what I mean.
Your metallurgist had to file down the rod from square-sided to its thinned rectangular shape to fit the gap of this clock's particular fork.
Because we don't have the exact length of the pendulum worked out yet (it involves how much thread you deploy to the pendulum) the brass block is held in place temporarily (for the purposes of testing) in an approximate position with a bit of painters tape as a stop to keep it from sliding down the rod.
And it is running beautifully on the stand now.
Without knowing the exact length of the pendulum needed this will require several days of testing and tweaking (gentle adjustments of the length of the thread).
Then, despite how pretty it looks, it will need a disassembly, cleaning and close inspection of every part to be sure it will last another 175 years.
More fun to come!
How is the block retained in the fork once the pendulum length is established?
ReplyDeleteAn excellent question and a topic that will be covered in an upcoming post.
DeleteThis is an excellent question and will be covered as part of a future post.
ReplyDelete