A Tale of Two Clocks
Published in two parts in the March and April 2011 editions of the BHI Horological Journal and in the July/August edition of the NAWCC Bulletin.
A tale of two clocks
The term “Vienna Regulator” brings to many people’s minds a long, narrow wall clock, particularly those with fancy carved tops and columns on the doors made by that great clockmaker Gustav Becker. Why, some even had horsies on top! Dana Blackwell (1) once observed “Today ‘Vienna Regulator’ has become more of a generic term for any long narrow wall clock..”.
In my collecting and, later, selling of Vienna Regulators from Austria, and “Vienna style” regulators from the German factories, I have come to appreciate the variety of styles and heritage associated with these clocks. Vienna Regulators and the Vienna-style regulators are first and foremost “Regulators”, with implied accuracy from being weight driven, and from the use of Graham dead beat escapements. The wide variety of case designs reflect the furniture styles prevalent where and when they were made. Today we can find an amazing and disparate assortment, everything from the rectilinear simplicity of an early 1800s Viennese laturndluhren to the ornate exuberance of the later Altdeutsche period, or the smooth, flowing lines of the Serpentine cases. In addition to these variations in cases we also find fundamental differences between the hand-made Viennese and the German factory-made mechanisms – perhaps as different from each other as a hand-made Aston Martin and a production line Ford Taurus
It is hard to believe that all lumped into the genre of Vienna Regulators!
One of my recent shipments of clocks from Austria contained two rather special examples of what are commonly-called “Vienna Regulators”. While both are floor-standing clocks (Bodenstanduhren in German), and both run for longer than a week (making them long duration clocks), they differ in one very interesting, and important way: One is Austrian, hence a “Vienna Regulator”, the other is German, made in the Viennese-style by Gustav Becker.
This article focuses on their similarities, as well as their differences, and hopefully provides a simplistic understanding of the social and economic realities behind their development. Since the Austrians began making Vienna Regulator roughly a half century before the German factories began making Vienna-style regulators, lets first look into the origins of the Austrian Vienna Regulators.
If you would like to see more pictures of these two clocks please follow these links:
The Becker clock - http://snclocks.smugmug.com/Fantastic-Clock-Mechanisms/VR-639-2-Month-Duration
The Salfer clock - http://snclocks.smugmug.com/Fantastic-Clock-Mechanisms/VR-641-2-month-3-Weight
Read MoreA tale of two clocks
The term “Vienna Regulator” brings to many people’s minds a long, narrow wall clock, particularly those with fancy carved tops and columns on the doors made by that great clockmaker Gustav Becker. Why, some even had horsies on top! Dana Blackwell (1) once observed “Today ‘Vienna Regulator’ has become more of a generic term for any long narrow wall clock..”.
In my collecting and, later, selling of Vienna Regulators from Austria, and “Vienna style” regulators from the German factories, I have come to appreciate the variety of styles and heritage associated with these clocks. Vienna Regulators and the Vienna-style regulators are first and foremost “Regulators”, with implied accuracy from being weight driven, and from the use of Graham dead beat escapements. The wide variety of case designs reflect the furniture styles prevalent where and when they were made. Today we can find an amazing and disparate assortment, everything from the rectilinear simplicity of an early 1800s Viennese laturndluhren to the ornate exuberance of the later Altdeutsche period, or the smooth, flowing lines of the Serpentine cases. In addition to these variations in cases we also find fundamental differences between the hand-made Viennese and the German factory-made mechanisms – perhaps as different from each other as a hand-made Aston Martin and a production line Ford Taurus
It is hard to believe that all lumped into the genre of Vienna Regulators!
One of my recent shipments of clocks from Austria contained two rather special examples of what are commonly-called “Vienna Regulators”. While both are floor-standing clocks (Bodenstanduhren in German), and both run for longer than a week (making them long duration clocks), they differ in one very interesting, and important way: One is Austrian, hence a “Vienna Regulator”, the other is German, made in the Viennese-style by Gustav Becker.
This article focuses on their similarities, as well as their differences, and hopefully provides a simplistic understanding of the social and economic realities behind their development. Since the Austrians began making Vienna Regulator roughly a half century before the German factories began making Vienna-style regulators, lets first look into the origins of the Austrian Vienna Regulators.
If you would like to see more pictures of these two clocks please follow these links:
The Becker clock - http://snclocks.smugmug.com/Fantastic-Clock-Mechanisms/VR-639-2-Month-Duration
The Salfer clock - http://snclocks.smugmug.com/Fantastic-Clock-Mechanisms/VR-641-2-month-3-Weight
Figure 16 – Strike Train Fans – The Becker fan is made from a flat piece of brass with cut outs, which was then bent to accommodate the arbor. The Salfer fan is typical for Viennese mechanisms, a piece that was machined out of a solid piece of brass. Note too the significantly larger pinion, though each pinion has the same number of gear teeth.
