A Tickless Clock

From The American Horologist magazine, February, 1946

A Tickless Clock
By W. H. Samelius

Many attempts have been made to create a tickless clock or silent escapement. Illustration of such a clock is one of the attempts that can easily be made by a workman who is equipped with a wheel cutting attachment for the lathe.

The figures for number of teeth and pinion leaves are shown in the illustration and it is up to the workman to decide the size of clock he may choose to construct.

Instead of the regular escape wheel and pallet, a small crank is attached to the last pinion, or driver. A horse shoe spring is connected between the crank and pendulum rod, the loop end of the horse shoe spring must fit freely over the studs that do the driving and some experimenting may be necessary to create a spring that will not allow the drive pinion to run wild, but a spring with tension enough to hold the drive pinion in check while the pendulum is making' it's excursion. The train is designed for seconds beat pendulum 39.14 inches long, measured from point of suspension to the center of the bob.

The drum is to be made large enough to take 16 coils of cable when the timepiece will run for 8 days. If carefully constructed, this clock will give satisfactory results and be perfectly silent when in motion.