oak/rosewood/maple pendulum clock in use

rosewood/oak pendulum clock

The last step of the bottom lip of the clock, which took a bit of finagling to make it look decent....limited supplies changes the equation. The LED's look pretty good, the pendulum has clearance, but the face and frame are off in spots, producing gaps and uneven edges....

rosewood/oak pendulum clock pt2

Just a mock up to see how it looks on the wall, obviously going to use different hands...

Almost done. I have to fabricate the bottom lip of the clock, with a notch for the pendulum to swing. I'm happy with the nitrocellulose finish, may need some light buffing for that shine.

wenge clock

Added some antique cherry bead molding. It goes pretty well with the wenge and adds a nice three dimensional aspect to the face.

This started as a rather thoughtless experiment with usinng clothes iron to press veneer...and it worked out pretty well for a wenge clock face. Its really hard make anything out of wenge that looks bad though.

pedulum clock pt 2

adventures in ghetto veneering continue, this time it turned out pretty well. tiger maple veneer hand cut for the box or encasement for the clock face and pendulum.

scrap sculpture using shaped wenge veneer

mondrian clocks fin

A long time coming, but you have let the nitrocellulose harden before you're really "done" and that takes about 30 days, sometimes more depending on the humidity. Also, finally got mintue/hour hands that look good on them.

rosewood/oak pendulum clock

Rough fit for the LED's, but you get the idea. Oh yeah, went with the red LED's, they have lower forward voltage demands, thus require less battery power than those gaudy white LED's.

4 red LED's, in series, 9V supply, SPST switch, 2x 47ohm resistors.

Grain filler, coat the first. I'm gonna do two coats of grain filler, sanding with some 320grit wet sand paper. The grain filler really does make the grain pop out, especially with the rosewood.

Settled on a design, drilled 4 holes at the 12, 3, 6, and 9 positions relative to the center. At each of those "cardinal clock numbers" (I just made that term up, but it sounds sensible, right?) I am installing White LED's in some nifty chrome LED mounts; thus making time telling easy and snazzy....like telling time with jazz hands.

Rosewood and quarter cut oak. I tried different approach this time, by way of using a thin sheet of mdf as back to this pattern. I've got to add a frame around the perimeter, mostly likely I'll use rosewood, and off set it by 1/8" or so to give clearance for the pendulum. I'm thinking of using some old timey bead trim to bring out the pattern some, but that will have to wait until this is dried, drilled and sanded.

On a sidenote, I kinda see now that this pattern is reminiscent of an American flag, but is really based on this ubiquitous image seared into our frontal lobes:








I am in the midst of laying out a exact replica of color bars in assorted African and Asian hardwoods...stay tuned

mondrian clock series mock-ups

Mock-ups of both Mondrian style wood clocks, each have 7 coats of nitrocellulose....not final on the seconds/minute hands on each.

M-0002 - Wall Clock Series

Brazilian cherry, western cedar, quarter sawn oak heartwood, soft maple, yellowood. Black maple perflings outlining different woods. Next up, finishing.

Checkerboard Clock

Checkerboard pattern with Brazilian Cherry, Quartersawn White Oak, and Yellowood. Glued and clamped. After 2 rounds clear filler and some sanding. Natural maple purflings added, and first coat of nitrocellulose.