Clock of the day (2)

To get this site started off in style, I'm uploading a few clocks today. This one is from the French company FFR. It is a calendar clock from the 1950s, operated by two "D" type 1.5volt batteries. The case is wood with a formica front. The calendar mechanism consists of a motorised roller system with a long paper roll bearing every date from the 1st of March to the 29th of February. This is activated very noisily at midnight every night, and every year on the 1st of March it has to rewound all the way to the beginning! At least the process is motorised...

The movement part is also interesting. It is of typical high quality French construction, with finely cut wheels, solid pinions, and a platform lever escapement. The auto-winding system is performed by a swivelling magnet which travels between the poles of a horse-shoe electromagnet. In fact this is more like a motor rewind than a kick rewind, although the motor in this case can only rotate about 45 degrees.

I have seen kitchen clocks offered for sale on the Internet with this same type of movement. It would seem that many movements which were commonplace in their country of origin were rare or even unknown in the UK, an aspect of clock collecting which has come about solely as a result of the global village. There are indeed great discoveries to be made out there but in many cases it requires a second look. The name FFR itself may have been unknown in the UK. Another clock with this name will be featured later... being the subject of a desperate quest for parts.

The calendar clock featured here seems to be a rare model. I have only ever seen one more FFR clock with this calendar system.