The Complete Handbook of Desk & Shelf Clocks

Chapter 1: Understanding Desk & Shelf Clocks

A desk clock is any clock designed to sit on a flat surface - a desk, a table, a mantelpiece, a shelf - as opposed to being mounted on a wall or worn on the body. A shelf clock is the broader term for the same category, used especially when the intended surface is a bookcase, sideboard, or mantel rather than a working desk. In practice, the two names describe the same physical things: a clock with a base, a body, and a face, sometimes with a handle or a folding stand, occasionally with a chime or an alarm. The category includes everything from a $12 battery-powered travel clock to an antique weight-driven shelf regulator worth several thousand dollars. This book treats them all together, because the practical questions - What makes it keep time? How do I set it? How do I care for it? - are largely the same across the entire range.

The first thing to understand about desk and shelf clocks is that the name does not tell you what is inside. Nearly all of them fall into one of three movement families: quartz, mechanical, or electric. A quartz movement uses a battery-powered integrated circuit that vibrates a small quartz crystal at 32,768 times per second and divides that frequency down to drive a stepping motor that turns the hands. A mechanical movement uses a mainspring (or, in some antique shelf clocks, a falling weight) to store energy, a