CloxWorx

Hello, and welcome to the CloxWorx page, which showcases the past, current and proposed mechanisms and ideations from the depths of my imagination!

The unique, eclectic and definitely arcane hand-made clocks, games, automata and other ideation realisations from the rocambolesque imagination of Lord John Roberts All the mechanisms are of my own design, which either arrive as flashes of inspiration, design studies reflecting a tangible solution to an imaginary problem, or are commissioned pieces. Very rarely, I have donated mechanisms to specia

l people or worthy causes. I don't consider myself an expert in horology, electronics or carpentry - I just enjoy working with wood and the various technical aspects of the individual mechanisms. Currently the machine workshop is in the middle of a renovation, which will probably take until Spring 2025. An extra floor will be added for storage, and the workshop extended with a separate room for equipment and tools that are rarely used, allowing the machine room to be more space-efficient. In addition to this, the existing admin and assembly area will be re-jigged; the admin area will remain but the assembly area will give way to a final set-up and soak testing bench, with a new room dedicated solely to the assembly of ongoing projects.

03/06/2026

Today's Nouvvingt update: first experiments with PCB fabrication! 😱

The last PCB I made involved rubbing down Letraset transfers onto a copper-clad board, but home PCB-making has moved on significantly since then, with various methods touting success at 'low cost.' I decided to try the most common ones and found the results, shall we say, interesting! 😁

Plenty of copies of the prototype PCB layout were printed out and applied to the board using:
A: soaking the transfer with nail varnish remover
B: a 50/50 mix of acetone and alcohol sprayed onto the transfer, and
C: ironing on using generic heat-transfer paper

Method A didn't work at all, not even remotely, and the results from B were unusable to say the least. The supposedly least-likely-to-work method, C, actually yielded a 99% usable PCB transfer with just a couple of errors that could easily be touched up if needs be. But, as this was just an experiment the transfer is good enough to progress to the next stage, which will be etching! 😷🤢🤮

Be kind, everyone ❤️

26/05/2026

Welcome to the fourth Monty's Monday Mixture (an occasional feature detailing projects other than clocks and automata) and yes I know it's Tuesday - it was a bank holiday yesterday! Today: a one-off house sign to aid taxidrivers, couriers and Just Eat!

The sign was fabricated at relatively low cost by using wood and Littlefair's wood dye from stock, therefore neccesitating only the purchase of a suitably sized slab of oak from The Wood Room and Chestnut Products aerosol Acrylic Sanding Sealer and Gloss Lacquer.

The oak slab was cut roughly to size - about 600 x 250mm - and a 6mm thick oak border stained using several coats of black ebony stain was added. Individual letters were then cut using the scroll saw from more planed and thickness'd 6mm oak, and finished externally and internally by machine and hand sanding. Each letter was then stained in several coats of black ebony to match the border. The outside edge of the oak slab was also sanded level and more stain added.

The letters were attached using cryo glue for speed of drying, before the entire sign was sprayed with two coats of sanding sealer and three coats of gloss lacquer on all sides for protection, after the workshop was temporarily turned into a large spraying booth!

Please note that this was a one-off project for a friend. Design work now continues on Nouvvingt with an update of ongoing PCB experiments due very soon.

Be kind, everyone ❤️

06/05/2026

For my Norfolk-based woodworking artisan friends; check out this great selection of various woodworking project books new in at the North Walsham Book Nook! Grab yourself a bargain, try something new and help a great charity all at the same time 😍

22/04/2026

A Whimsically Wacky Wednesday to everyone! 🤪 Today: disorganised chaos reigns supreme, or does it?

One dreaded task, and the cause of considerable procrastination, is the arrangement of the electronics. The prototype circuit has been soak-tested for over a year without issue so it is time to formally commit the design to Copper-Clad Flame Retardant Glass Epoxy Laminate Substrate, or in other words, a PCB (printed circuit board) of some kind.

My usual 'go to' product is either Stripboard or Tripad Board, but I am seriously considering designing and fabricating my own PCBs, something I haven't done for about 40 years! I believe the process has moved on from Letraset transfers but the 'smells-not-of-roses' Ferric Chloride etching step remains the same! 🙊🤢🤮

However, before any design can be committed to, every single component much be physically measured - height, width, depth, pin spacings and diameter etc - for the purpose of guaranteeing compliance on the board. So this week's task is just that. And yes, that is a 2nd laptop running Win7 Pro, because, well... why not? 😁

Be kind, everyone ❤️

02/04/2026

Last week afforded a visit to London to gaze upon some of the most, if not *the* most important clocks and watches ever made. Royal Observatory Greenwich maintain John Harrison's H1, H2, H3 and H4 and in combination with the Science Museum houses incredible working examples of other John and James Harrison, George Graham and Thomas Tompion clocks, amongst many other world-renowned clockmakers. What an absolute joy to watch these ground-breaking and life-changing devices in working order and keeping perfect time; I could've watched and listened to them all day. And somewhere in the depths of my never-forget-anything ND mind I even managed to impart some time-keeping information to the staff at the Royal Observatory that they didn't know! No trip to London would be complete without a visit to the 98-year-old world clock at Piccadilly Circus underground station either; most fascinating to view the country names and borders of nearly a century ago! 😍

21/03/2026

Salutations on a Strategic Saturday! Whilst Nouvvingt remains on test I thought it was a good time to post something a little different, even though it's not Monday! ♟️♟️♟️

Today I present a previous project of mine - a full sized draughts/chess board. Designed and built during a time when I didn't have access to more exotic woods, the entire board is made from Baltic birch ply and a few slabs of lead! If I was to recreate the project I would use different woods and slightly different techniques, but it was a great learning experience nonetheless.

Stained using Indian Rosewood, Jacobean Dark Oak and White Ash, the project was finished overall using Super Blonde Shellac in order to avoid darkening the white board pieces. Construction was a little tricky in that the 64 board squares had to be stained separately and then carefully sanded on all edges to create a perfectly level, perfectly fitted 8 x 8 board with no gaps in between any of the pieces.

Several layers make up the base, which is edged with a finishing strip and inlaid around the playing board with a wooden binding inlay to set it off. Some of the base is hollowed out, in which has been added several sheets of lead in order to give the board a decent weight, a technique I've used on other projects. The underside was finished off with a green felt baize to avoid damaging the surface of anything it was placed upon.

Be kind, everyone ❤️

09/03/2026

Welcome to Monty's Monday Mixture #3 - a ringed triple candle set of my own design in spalted beech! 🕯️🕯️🕯️

Cut from a single blank of around 6" (150mm) diameter and 2" (50mm) thick, I intended creating something striking with as little waste as possible from a commonly available blank. It was my first time working with (any species of) spalted wood, and it certainly was a learning experience being aware of the risk of splitting 'delicately' thin sections, however all was well.

In short, the three candle holders were cut from the centre of the blank and the two outer rings were fabricated from the remaining piece. As this was the first attempt at my design, working out in what order to cut and finish the five pieces took some time! When assembling the pieces I ensured the orientation of the pieces matched the original grain pattern as closely as possible, to restore the look of a single piece of wood.

Finishing the pieces also required planning as some areas of the pieces couldn't be sealed until after gluing together, making it difficult to finish the end product. I ended up brushing on Chestnut Products shellac sanding sealer by hand, lightly buffing it to a satin sheen. I didn't use any of my traditional polishes in order to avoid build up of product in the deeper grain sections, but I think the end result is just fine as it is. Let me know what you think, and whether I should make more of these!

Be kind, everyone ❤️

25/02/2026

A Wonderful Wednesday to all! 😊 Today: Function-Before-Form ⚙️🔜😍

Although hardly pretty to look at, Nouvvingt's proof-of-concept is functioning very well. All the electronics remain in prototype form with the timing module, motor control and automated lighting circuits built on 'breadboard' with various controls added for adjusting the automated lighting under all conceivable conditions. Understandably laden with dust; the circuits themselves have been running constantly for almost one year now with no issues.

The clock movement, in its final prototype form, simply sits on top of the motor module, which is controlled by the timing circuit and positioning sensors, causing the motor to advance one-half revolution every minute. This is 'geared down' through the movement to display the time on the hands, which point to a temporary basic paper printout of minute markers, used to keep an eye on the accuracy of the movement.

To set the time, the movement module is simply lifted off the base, the movement's wheels rotated to the correct time, and the module replaced. No complicated or delicate time setting mechanism required! At the moment, the movement and dial illumination LEDs are hard wired, but in the final builds they will utilise fibre optics to allow the movement module to be completely untethered from all mechanical and electronic aspects of the clock.

I am hoping in the near future to film a 24-hour time-lapse of the prototype. Watch this space for more updates!

Be kind, everyone ❤️

02/02/2026

Today: The second Monty's Monday Mixture (an occasional feature detailing projects other than clocks and automata).

Because there is very little to show with regards to Nouvvingt this month and I had a little downtime, a couple of outstanding music-related commissions were completed: wooden mounting plates for a compact guitar effects pedal case and an amplifier combo speaker conversion. Not very horologic I know, but please bear with me during the quiet months! 🙏

A small wooden plate was fabricated in order to mount an effects pedal and other ancillary components into a compact Gator bag to replace a much larger solid flight case - effectively halving the size, drastically reducing the weight and generally making the set up more portable and easier to handle. The base plate included stand offs to not only lift the pedals slightly higher in the bag but also utilise empty spaces underneath them for cable routing.

The speaker already incorporated a novel slot in which one of their own branded amplifiers could be fitted, however an amplifier was already available so a mounting plate was fabricated to hold the differently-sized amplifier securely and in the correct position, allowing easy access to the controls whilst keeping them below the top plane of the cabinet.

In clock news, Nouvvingt remains on test and I hope to post some photos or possibly a short video very soon! Watch this space!

Be kind, everyone ❤️

14/01/2026

A Wondrous Wrecking Wednesday to all! 😊 Today: Break-Before-Make 🔨🪚🕰️

Sometimes, as in life, it's necessary to dismantle and rebuild something in order to improve certain aspects of the item in question. Such was the case with Nouvvingt, because I was becoming increasingly unhappy with the problematic overly-complex rotating cradle mechanism which was used to simply set the time. In a flash of inspiration I believe I have come up with a far simpler solution, and that is not to have a time-setting mechanism at all!

The nature of my clock builds revolve around open movements where everything is visible, and the use of wood dictates that the movement elements are almost always oversized. My solution to setting the time was a simple one inspired by recent work on the Harding & Bazeley spherical weight clock, and that is to construct the movement as a complete, but entirely separate, self-contained unit. This is a radical departure from my previous clocks, which generally have the movement parts and all other elements mounted within the clock's main framework.

The result of this design change now sees the self-contained oversized clock movement in its own dedicated framework, sitting atop the main body of the clock itself. Setting the time is now extremely easy: acheived by simply lifting the movement from the clock, rotating the wheelwork of the movement to the correct time, and placing the movement back down on top of the clock where it meshes with the motor drive. Simples! Watch this space for more updates!

Be kind, everyone ❤️

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