Thinking of replacing the old not running grandfather clock movement with a battery operated model there are two things very important to measure before putting down those big bucks....Well not really big bucks for battery operated movements are much cheaper than weight driven models....After you remove the old movement measure the diameter of the hole the new movement goes in to plus how long the shaft should be to stick through the hole and enough sticking out the front side for a thin flat washer and enough threads left for the nut to secure the movement inside the wood housing...

  All the pendulum models will run with or without the pendulum attached and does not have to be swinging to keep the correct time...The movement that corrects for daylight savings time is handy and saves lots of labor!! Some movements plays different tunes and the switch is on the back to set to play either one. they also come with a volume switch. I have found the movements that takes D cell battery's will last longer on each battery...and you guessed it , the cost is reflective for the quality....

 Some, you never have to set to start with. Just put the battery in and sit it down and it will go forward and reverse and stop. Then when you thought you paid good money for something that don't work, it will start again and keep good time till you start screwing around with it again. Even if the battery is removed for any reason all you have to do is replace the battery, don't tough the hands and it will set its self to the correct time as long as you don't screw around with the hands and for sure don't remove the hands but if you happened to do so, you have to put them back on exactly as they were set before you started making mistakes and not reading the instructions... There are two different models having the automatic procedure. One uses the Greenwich Mean Time in Colo. for its signals and the other model has chips installed to do all this automatically for the next 35 years.. But...   these two model does not have chimes or pendulums. They only produce info with the big hand and the little hand and the user has to be smart enough to decide.

 Thanks for the tips Jess. I've found that if you purchase an electronic movement that has to be manually set & chimes on the hour that you can only turn it forward. Spring ahead one hour, no problem. Fall behind you'll have to advance the clock 23 hours for the chimes to be correct. My clock has a switch setting to stop chiming at 10 pm & starts chiming at 6 am. If I only advance the clock 11 hours in the fall it won't ring during the day but start ringing at 6 pm all through the night to 10 am.

Bob I'm a little lazier than you are. Instead of advancing that little hard to turn knob all that twisting and turning I just take the battery out and wait and hour then put it or them them back in. Yes setting for silence at night makes lots of folks happy.

23 hours ago, Smallpatch said:

Instead of advancing that little hard to turn knob all that twisting and turning I just take the battery out and wait and hour then put it or them them back in.

  That thought never even entered my brain Although that does takes away all the fun of me trying to get my fat finger on that flat little wheel. Simple minded people are easily fascinated

Just out of curiosity, do any of those battery operated movements have the ability to recieve the "atomic" signals? 

Yes Gene I described the two I know of in the # 1 rant..  After you have installed the movement in to the thing you built by putting the little washer and nut on securely. That means if you put the nut on too tight you will pull the guts right out of the plastic housing so go easy on the torque superman. The next instructions tells you to install both hands on 12 then put in the battery, batteries in....If it is a unit that runs by the signals from Colo, I have found it has trouble picking up the signal if you are in a metal building, like my shop... So I take it in the house and install the gas er  batteries. Then do nothing but watch....First when it starts running, and I do mean running for it will go around a few times one way , stop then, go the other way...no telling what it is doing. One hour takes like 20 seconds, but don't worry... Eventually it will settle down and give good service as long as you don't screw around with the hands.... When the battery wears out simply replace the battery and it will find the right time with out any help. It sets itself for daylight savings time. The ones we have changes about 7 at night for some reason?? I have 8 or 9 at any one time in the house.... The other model has chips to do all that remembering to change itself and is set to do this for 35 years....

  These movements are less that 10 dollars American money...

  Klockit and a few others has all the info you need to be an experto. 

Bob sometimes we do forget when that on hour is up sometimes but it is still easier on my little fingers to then turn it forward a few minutes to the correct time. Instead of using your fat fingers try the eraser on a wooden pencil to do the turning. And the movements having a pendulum the flat little knob is partly behind the swing pendulum but stopping it does not hurt the time keeping feature...

  Gene after we had these atomic model movements in the house for a few years I decided to stay up and watch what the hands did during the fall back mode. I took a few years to actually see anything strange for every time I would wake up and gaze that direction the silly thing had already done its thing.. Then one night about 7 the hands started to move and it stopped when it got to where it was going.....so by this I just assume the silly thing just stops for one hour then proceeds like nothing ever happened....

Edited September 21, 20196 yr by Smallpatch

@Smallpatch, thanks for the info, Jesse. We have problems with ours when the time changes. Since AZ doesn't change, we have to switch them to Pacific time then, back to MT time when it changes again. Sometimes it takes an hour or so before the clock catches up. But, it always does....eventually.

Gene I'm wondering what will happen if America drops daylight savings time like some are wanting them to do completely. I hope the movements are smart enough to forget it ever happened..

Also I knew they put the switch on the back for what ever time zone a person lived in so I just assumed they put a space there for Arizona and or other states that didn't need it..

So why did you buy an atomic movement since you live in Arizona?

4 hours ago, Smallpatch said:

So why did you buy an atomic movement since you live in Arizona?

We didnt. They were both gifts. 

6 hours ago, Smallpatch said:

So why did you buy an atomic movement since you live in Arizona?

He's keeping up with the times, entering the Atomic age and all that.  

I wanted to know how Jess learned all those don'ts.  Surely there was not enough time to figure it all out by observation.  

Steve if you don't learn from your mistakes you are in a heap of trouble..

  The first and only movement I got the nut a little too tight and pulled the stem out of the plastic body. It happened only once so I changed the way I secure those units in to the housing. Once is enough to do something different......now, after I snug the nut down I add a little Elmer's on each corner and when dried things will stay as they should.....the larger units that has a pendulum and chimes and songs and these units are larger but also needs to stay in the correct position for all the things to work properly..

  Warranty and a persons screw ups are totally different to me and besides calling someone in Wis. on a 9 dollar item just don't make sense. 

  I also learned not to drill the hole for a 3/8" shaft for a movement I just ordered for it might come in being a 5/16" shaft instead of, then trying to find a reducer to go from a 3/8" down to a 5/16" hole ain't easy....

 This one plain jane cheap movement I like to use on the cheap clocks has had a 10 year warranty ever since I been building clocks. No one has ever ask me to do anything about their clock quit running except the battery run down. I like to buy them 10 at a time for that extra discount....Last year they cut the 10 years down to 2 years and here I am with 18 new movements. Not real joyed over that news but if they still make them the same, no problem...

  The units that take the large batteries last the longest...We bought a clock made using a piece of drift wood while on vacation up in Cresent City, Cal. about 50 years ago and by golly it still runs and the battery last three or four years I think... This is what decided me to build clocks as a hobby for the way the cheap movements last.