Tascione

A few years ago, I played in the pit orchestra for a production of Cinderella. One of the stage "techies" knew that I messed about with clocks, and asked me if I could create a stage clock that could be set by inexperienced people for 2330, 2352 and 0000 (midnight). The clock face was to be ten to twelve feet above the stage, so the hands would have to be set from behind the stage, by someone standing on the floor. I decided the easiest way would be to create a couple of pulleys, driven by watch lathe belting, with stops, and with a rope that could be operated from below. Here are bunch of photos. As it turned out, the most difficult part was laying out and cutting the hands. I used a piece of lamp pipe for the hour pipe, and 1/4-20 threaded rod for the minute arbor.

Here are some more photos:

And here it is at 2352:
I didn't create the dial; that was done by the people doing set design and construction. They just told me the diameter of the minute track, and the height of the hour numerals so that I could design the hands. They had the dial painted before I could tell them that the 4 should be done with four straight lines.

Dave,,
That is a very very clever design and must have been a interesting and fun project.

John