I was commissioned to upgrade a clock to quartz for a good friend of mine with a 72 Skylark. I ran into the same issues I always have with these clocks and I thought I'd share my fix for them The first issue I always seem to run into is removing the three nuts on the back. The standoffs inside the clock are aluminum and they are always loose. Thry are swaged to the clock face mounting plate. So when you try and remove the nuts the standoffs just spin inside the clock and there's no way to hold it still. Super annoying These are the culprits- The only way to get the nuts off is to take a whizz wheel and cut a slot in the end. And even that doesn't even work sometimes. You csn see the slot I cut in this one. I needed to figure out an inexpensive solution to replace these after I mangled them. I drilled out all three standoffs from the clock face mounting plate I got three 10-24x 1 3/4" machine screws and nuts. I nut and bolted it to the plate The original standoffs measure 1.206" I went to Ace hardware and got three 1" aluminum spacers and some #10 washers So with the nut holding the machine screw, the spacers and 2 washers, we have a measurement of 1.238. That's a difference of like .032. Good enough for the girls I date.. So here it is all stacked together And now back together without seeing mangled threads sticking out the back of the clock. And if for whatever reason it's gotta come apart again, I won't have to fight with spinning standoffs...
The hour and minute hands are faded. Also kinds beat up looking I use testors florescent red to repaint them which is almost a dead on match
But...Does it work??? lol... I should do this to my 24 hours clock(s)...Where did you get the quartz from??
Came from instrument services. Of course it works! What kinda operation do you think I'm running here? Lol
To remove 2 of the 3 nuts, you can also insert needle nose pliers thru the light holes and hold the shaft.
Bought a quartz movement from OPGI, a core clock from Cole. A fiddly, PITA job. All those years of model making paid off, and I too used modelling paint on the needle. Did the speedo and fuel gauge too.
Jason, Would you consider rebuilding these clocks for other board members? Mine would be for my '64 Skylark. I have multiple cores, but not the quartz movement. Maybe add it to your shifter rebuilds!
I thought about it! I'll probably wind up trying to get ahold of a few clocks, restore them and reselling them on here I did come up with a better solution on the standoffs. Black70buick has 3D printed me plastic standoffs that will replace the factory ones without the added washers and nuts. So stay tuned!
