Cuckoo Clock Build

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I keep a toolbox on hand by my desk so that I can tinker with things (mainly RC cars) and my precision screwdrivers are some of my most used tools. Unfortunately, they're not particularly long or graceful. I was able to get a couple of the screws out, but not all screws were equally easy to reach. Luckily, I had another estate sale find that was eager to come to the rescue:

Long, elegant, antique screwdriver to the rescue! I'm not sure what this thing's original purpose was, but for all I know it was made to take apart cuckoo clocks because that's what it's good at.

Unfortunately, getting the screws out was only half the battle. The bronze clock mechanism also includes a long, spindle-like piece on the front side that juts out of the wood, and this is where the clock hands are. The hands and some other small pieces had to be removed from this spindle so that the mechanism could be pulled out of the back of the clock. A few of these pieces unscrewed and the rest were friction fit. You can see those pieces as well as the mechanism screws in the above photo, with micro SD drive for scale.

Once I removed the hands, I was dismayed to discover that the mechanism, though loose, still wouldn't come out of the housing. It wouldn't fit between the two wooden whistles on either side of it, which seemingly had been glued into place after the mechanism had been attached. Crud. Soon it became clear that in order to fix the clock, I would either have to remove one of the whistles or try to pry the whole front panel of the clock free. Since the bellows were glued and I could not immediately determine what was holding the front panel in place, I tried removing the front first.

In order to remove the front panel of the clock, I realized I would first have to remove the decorative trim that framed it. Although it was glued in place, the glue job was a bit lacking and it was pretty easy to remove. Once I had done so, it became apparent that removing the front panel also meant I would have to disturb the cuckoo herself! Not only that, but the front panel was held in place with four stubborn looking tiny nails. I didn't want to mess with any of those, so I turned to the second option, which was removing one of the whistles/bellows.

After about 30 seconds of research on "un-gluing wood," I found an online source that recommended using a sharp chisel. I didn't have one of those, so instead I used... a screwdriver. It sort of worked.

This really seemed like a "no turning back" point. I tried to loosen the sides where the whistle met the side of the housing with an X-acto knife, then very gently wedged a screwdriver into the crack between the whistle and the housing. With much crackling and popping, the wooden whistle finally popped loose! Unfortunately, a good chunk of the housing popped loose with it. In the above photos you can see where I stripped away the wood. Whoops! I then attempted to pry the splintered piece of the housing off of the whistle, but that proved to be nearly disastrous. Now, I'm just counting my blessings that this didn't end up worse somehow and will try to put the entire thing back as I found it when done.

With everything disassembled, I looked to see if Amazon had my missing pieces: the chains. I was feeling a bit pessimistic, but they actually have several types available! If it's not already clear, I really don't know what I'm doing. That said, I'm guessing/hoping that I have a model that needs to be wound every 24 hours. If not, I have ordered the wrong chains. Nothing to do now except play the waiting game until they arrive!