First escapement :(

[ArtF]

Ian:

  No sniggering required :), your almost there. The first escapement can drive you nuts because you havent the feel for it as yet, but after you get this one going youll find its all downhill and future ones take much less time and are
much easier.
  Lets get this one running. A recoil escapement should recoil..but your is recoiling too much. When you watch that
upper tooth hit note how far its pushing back the ratchet..too much. This means one of two things ( which is why I say its all a balance..), either the pendulum is too heavy and thus too hard to stop, OR the weight driving the ratchet is too light making it too easy to push backwards. Youll know you have it just right when the recoil is minimized. In theory the perfect point is where no recoil occurs, this means the pendulum is just right as is the drive weight.
    Heres my advice.. remove some weight from the pendulum, but make sure it still has enough that it will swing back and forth a few times when you release it unhooked from the pallets. Doesnt have to be much 5-6 swings gradually reducing to zero motion is fine I think. Then give it a try, note how much recoil occurs. It shouldnt go so far as to hit the curved portions of the tooth as it does now, that indicates not enough weight driving the ratchet.

  You are very close to getting that running, a bit less weight on the pendulum and a biot more on the ratchet I think will make it run. The ratchet is supposed to just add the amount of energy lost to friction as the pendulum swings, by the time the pallet hits the pendulums tooth it shoudl be just about out of steam , the ratchet will stop it fast because its about out of steam so it shouldnt recoil too much, if it does then less pendulum eight or more ratchet weight is required.
  Dont despair, youll get the hang of it fairly quickly when you hit the next spot. Your soon going to get 30-40 seconds of motion, then 5 minutes,..then forever. It just seems to work that way. Did for me anyway.. Im thinking just removing pendulum weight will do it now..but its possible you cant remove enough and will need some more ratchet drive weight..

Art


Art

[Ian]

Thanks Art


will try your suggestions as soon as possible

[John T]

Hi Ian,
I think you're a lot closer than you think you are.  By watching your video, as Art noted the upper pallet is going through a lot of recoil, if you tilt the vertical member of your frame a little to the left "clockwise" you'll notice a change.  You're looking for an even tick tock.  I'm pretty sure if you adjusted the vertical orientation to achieve a really even tick tock sound your mechanism will do its job.


John