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A good screw just isn't enough-it must oscillate!


hls30.com

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I have

Me!

Gary D.

Chris W.

Chris A.

Jack W.

Victor L.

Any more of you out there with a Rally clock that needs(or will need) internal updating(no change in outward installed appearance, only updated to a current and serviceable motor from the original motor that is sorely without the pivotal replacement part for its timing circuit).

If you have a rally clock and it is not in need of this update yet, please post as well. You will become a captive audience if(when) your tuning fork fails.

Not that I wish that on any of you with working assembleis, but...

Will

PS, PM if you want to be included but not publicly!

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That's a great collection of pictures from Jeff. Can I have the box? I'll give a hunnerdollars for the box! I recall someone asked about mounting location.

You guys are funny, what would you do with the box, I actually thought I had thrown it away when I installed the clock, but found it on the top shelf. I have had some of my NOS for so long I did not realize they were that hard to find. I still am looking for a NOS 240z dash emblem, anyone have one?

Has anyone ever put together a gallery of weird hard to find stuff for reference, that would be cool

FYI the clock was given to me by a friend, who had it for years, and thought I would appreciate it. No source to be had Sorry.

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Will,

Good work and you are right on. I have a schematic and part numbers from most of the parts,but you have other problems to overcome. The motor is obtainable and it is dc not ac. Gears are another problem and the bearing for the motor or other motor need to have a 14mil ID to work and maintain alignment with corresponding gears (I make these). Patents are still in place and Citizens and others are not willing to let them go(I've already tried). Also most of the parts were subcontracted and not made by Citizen. Citizen just put their name on the product.

You can and will ruin the tuning fork if you don't know what you doing. Just removing the ckt board from the housing can damage the fork. And lastly the media that attaches to the fork is a 2mil ribbon. You will have to have micro soldering or wire bonding tools (epoxy will not work).

Interested to learn the outcome...

zclocks

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This was cutting-edge technology of the day that went obsolete when the quartz movement was put firmly in place. 14inch rims and tires were the same cutting edge of technology then...try to find new 14" 5.5' wide rims and tires local to you now...

I could duplicate the circuit board in the oscillator with out issue, but the tuning fork is evidently simply NLA-uneless hand fabrication is used-and more importantly paid for...

I can solder smt, but I can't for the life of me find what to eat to poop a tuning forK(though I do have continuous and intimate first-hand knowledge of what it takes to make Kidney stones)!

Again my hope is to replace the entire drive assembly(oscilator and motor with a current quartz motor assembly). My clock appears to be in exceptional shape inside, clean, no discernable wear to the gears, and still flowing lubrication(non running puddles follow gravity) so on-granted I am baseing this observation on the difference between gages I pulled from the same dash-they had obvious wear, were bone dry, and a fair amount of dust in them. Obviously the clock was added later...

Will

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OK,

I dropped the clock and osc. off about 11am Thursday, and spent a little over an hour talking to the guy. The single knob rally clock he had was a Datsun branded part, but NOT FROM A Z!!! It was smaller and in a chromed housing and it was owned by the shop! I assume it was from either a Roadster or a 510. I didn't have my camera(like a blooming idiot), but I will get pictures of it the next time I visit the shop.

The gentleman was somewhat certian he could get a quartz movement in the Z clock, but the guy I spent time with was the mechanical genius of the shop, and he wanted to let the electronic genius have a go at it to see about repairing the original mechanism to get an actual frequency from the system. I told him that was fine, but we would still want a quartz based solution as well-being that the primary part of the oscillator was NLA, and evidently the weak link. I also asked about some of the other technology that they put to use, and got a very good feeling about their willingness to help find solutions to other much less important Z issues.

I agreed to leave the clock for a couple of weeks, to get it in their que, and got a detailed reciept for the clock and oscillator. I expect they will call when they come up with a direction...and I will pass on all of the progress/brick walls.

Will

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  • 3 weeks later...

I talked to the shop yesterday-they haven't touched it.

When I dropped it off, they had said it would take a couple of weeks to get through the que of waiting work, and I didn't specify that I would pay for a rush, so I don't yet see a problem in the timing; though, it is not as I have hoped. I did tell them I would be there on Friday(6/22, three weeks and a day after dropping it off) around Noon to visit(and take pictures of the other clock), and they promised to have it gone over and at least fully evaluated by then-barring acts of God.

Will

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  • 1 month later...

Update!

I picked up the rally clock and oscillator today.

The bad news is the quartz movement does not have enough torque to move the mechanism of the clock.

The good news is I spent an hour talking with the gentleman who worked on it, and discussed several ideas I had for get'n 'r done!

I have two known options for high torque motors, one of which I collected as insurance after dropping the clock off, and one of which I will order next week after trying out the motor I already have. The gentle man did kind of a "why didn't I think of that" when I 'splainde the first idea.

I'll update as I continue to get to the bottom of this.

Will

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  • 4 months later...
Another update,

I have rulled out the two attempts, but in the process came up with three more, so the project is still moving on.

Waiting on parts for this one and getting ready to make molds for another!(see the 1stgen seats thread) Will

Will, thanks for the update. My thoughts wandered back to the rally clock research when the headlight covers project came up again. As you know I'm highly interested in several of your projects - OEM-style headlight covers (because I only have one Nissan cover for passenger-side only), rally clock oscillator replacement/eliminator? and the proper OEM-like passenger-side mirror. Having one headlight covers is almost as bad as a non-working rally clock... almost. If you do come up with something to get the rally clock going then I have to get Dave to work on a white face gauge cover for it, if I decide to ever go that route. Best of luck on your further quest to perfect your several projects. I think many of us have benefited from your efforts on yours and our behalves and hope to continue to in the future.

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I looked at doing the Electro Luminescent version of the gages, and even ordered a set of metric gages from Speed hut-there was one issue with the speedo-I'll cover it on Daves white gage thread, and considered applying that EL technology to the rally clock. Because it is composed of two dials on its face, making both of them EL proved to be a challenge, but I did find a way!

When I get the inner face moving at the right speed(I do have it powered and moving with no Oscillator!), I'll start on making the EL kit.

Will

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