Swedish Interior Design

One question we always get asked by our clients is how do we set up our mora clock mechanism or should we go electric?
Unlike English clocks of the period with their precision made mechanisms, the Swedish mechanisms are extremely crude and functional – they give clock repairers nightmares! Whereas the english ones can be cleaned and repaired with relative ease , the mora mechanisms although incredibly simple require a different approach.
Our clockman is probably now the UK expert on Mora clocks now as he’s done so many for us but it took him quite a while to adjust his technique to the idiosynchrasies of the Mora way!
Here’s a typical mora mechanism so you can see what we mean
 

The mechanism as you can see sits on a wooden platform and is held in place by a single screw plate underneath so its easy to remove. The metal clockface is either screwed directly onto the wooden platform or more rarely clipped onto the mechanism itself.
Its very rough and ready and has 2 winders. Looking from the front, the left hand one winds the bell strike and the right hand one drives the hands. You can see the winding barrel in the above picture.
You hang an 8lb rough cast lead weight from a wooden wheel and hook hanging off the end of the string and gravity provides the power to drive the hands and chime. Some mora clock  mechanisms has single bells, others have 2 bells.
So next you slide off the clock hood towards you bracing the clock body – it can be a tight fit so be careful. Never try to fit the face/mechanism through the opening in the front of the clock hood – it doesnt work as the face is supposed to sit behind the hood front.
Go like this:

Next place the mora clock mechanism on its wooden platform across the 2 wooden uprights on the clock body like this

Next –
well we wait for our next blog post to look at how to put the pendulum and weights in place. 🙂
Jo Lee is Director of Swedish Interior Design