Clock O' Clock

A mechanical, music-themed baby grandfather clock.

Mechanical grandfather clocks have been around for centuries, valued for their intricate craftsmanship and ability to keep time with accuracy. These clocks operate through a system of gears, weights, and pendulums. For our project, we wanted to take this traditional idea and give it our own unique spin.

Project Overview

The goal of this project was to design and manufacture a mechanical grandfather clock with the primary goal of keeping accurate time. We wanted the clock to be unique, so we made it music themed, with a music note pendulum and a record for the clock face. We also designed it to be smaller than a traditional grandfather clock and have a shorter period to accommodate the shorter height.

Functional Requirements

Accurately keep time
- Time drift under +/- 5 min for 1 winding period
At least 2-hour winding period
Pendulum period of 1s

To begin, we set a list of project goals of the functional requirements for our clock. A mechanical clock is driven by the gravitational potential energy in the weights as they slowly fall. They eventually hit the bottom of the clock, and need to be rewound, so each clock has a winding period. This is the maximum amount of time it can function before needing to be rewound. We also wanted to make our clock smaller, so it would need a pendulum with a shorter period than the 2 second period of a traditional grandfather clock.

Meet the Team!

KD Vo

Mechanical Engineer '25

Maurice Ampane

Mechanical Engineer '26

Maya McKone-Sweet

Mechanical Engineer '26

Sanju Jatti

Mechanical Engineer '26

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