Mechanical wind-up antique clocks require manual power to operate.  A weight attached to a cord or a spring provides the force required to adjust the hands of the timepiece.  This force is first set into motion by the swinging of a pendulum, as a grandfather clock, or a teethed wheel in smaller clocks.  In the application of either a pendulum or a wheel, the force oscillates back and forth to the engineered intervals.  Clocks are designed with minimal friction for the oscillation pieces, yet both pendulums and wheels will eventually slow down and require adjusting.

Electric clocks, powered by battery or outlet, do not have a complex system of tension and torque.  Instead, a simple electric burst fires for power.  There are four different types of electric clocks. The one is a type that uses electricity to power the oscillation. One uses electricity to directly move the hands on the clock face, one uses electromagnetism to drive a pendulum, and one drives the faces of the clock with an internal motor, often relying upon the specific frequency of the clock’s own power source for accuracy.  In each of these electric clocks, the clock parts themselves do not change; only the mechanism for propelling the pendulum and hands varies.

These antique wall clocks came in several styles. Some neon clocks featured a bezel with neon lettering displaying an advertiser’s name, product, and telephone number; others featured a neon face with the bezel trimmed to one of the colors of an advertiser’s logo, with that logo printed in the middle of the face; still others featured neon hands and numbers surrounding a company or dealer’s logo.

Today, there are still small businesses that like to feature neon clocks, but there are homeowners or renters who like to display them featuring some of their favorite icons, whether antique automotive or soft drink logos or vintage entertainment figures and designs. Where they sold originally in the high hundreds to the low thousands, due to their special construction and mostly commercial usage, today they can be found in the lower hundreds even as made-to-order collectibles.

Curtis Clocks, for example, makes a series of neon clocks commemorating historical corporate images from consumer brands (Chevrolet, RCA, Philco, Harley-Davidson, Pontiac, Firestone) to the generic (movie theaters, watch repair, radio tubes, motels, bar signs) to history (the White Star Line—owners of the ill-fated Titanic). They sell many of their pieces on eBay.

WaynesNeonClocks.com makes to-order neon clocks, often featuring a half-bezel for a business name and a logo in the middle of the face. However, they also make historical clocks in neon, lighted face, and spinning-light bezels, featuring such popular items as classic soft drink logos (Pepsi-Cola, 7-Up, Orange Crush), automotive logos (Mobilgas, Texaco, Sinclair-HC, Quaker State oil, Studebaker, Indian motorcycles), and historical miscellany (Buster Brown shoes, Borden’s dairy, Westinghouse radio tubes, Dairy Queen).

And IloveNeon.com offers a large number of neon clocks, with or without logos, at prices ranging from $49.95-$269.95, with the more expensive models being 20 inches diameter compared to the less expensive beginning at 14 inches diameter.

Large wall clocks come in all shapes and forms to suit different tastes, now the most popular design tends to be the rather basic dark colored clock which people place in the living room or the kitchen. It blends perfectly and its a simple choice. If you are looking for something different and more unique then why not opt for one of the wonderful retro wall clocks, you can get them in many different colors from bright blue to white. Just make sure they blend in with the surrounding furniture.

Wood can be a pleasant choice for Large Wall Clocks, the beauty of wood is that it never clashes with different colors and it can blend in perfectly with any type of furniture or designs you may have around the room. You can find a great selection of wood clocks, from the hand carved rare kind to your more basic large clock that you can stand on the ground or hand on the wall depending on which way you rather to display it.  When selecting a clock for your home remember to keep it unique, this is going to be one of the first things that a person will see when entering you home so keep it simple and special, and make sure it is something that makes you smile when you see it.

Public Houses and Inns were probably the first to introduce wall clocks and featured round faces. As homes became more affluent, and able to afford these mechanical wall clocks, the clocks were adapted to the home but were not as accurate as the tavern wall clocks.

While thinking something as common today as a clock would have a social impact, especially on one’s status in society, that was the case in the 18th century. This being due to their cost which was out of reach for the majority of people.

English wall clock pendulum parts were spring driven with the early ones having a verge escapement. These were later replaced with the more accurate anchor escapements.

However, anchor escapements called for a longer pendulum then the verge and, as a result, required a larger, longer case. The dials of wall clocks are protected by glass and are normally painted wood or brass. On rare occasions you’ll find dials made of iron.

Wall clocks made in England and the United States tended to be made of wood, often imported from the West Indies, while the French rococo style wall clocks featured more metal in their construction.

Clock makers in the United States were the first to use mass production and their early clocks were the Banjo clock.

These featured the anchor escapement with a long pendulum and the drive mechanism was done with wind-up weights. They usually had dials painted white and were made of metal.

Antique Banjo clocks can hold great value, as can any antique wall clock, but there are many Banjo clock reproductions…so be careful in making any purchases.

These days there has been a bit of a resurgence in the wearing of digital watches and many people know think its cool to find a Casio model from the 1970′s in Ebay and put it on when they go out clubbing. I suppose its more to do with the fact that many of the people who are buying things online these days were very young when thees things came round for the first time and there is a little nostalgia attached to them.

Thanks to the popularity of the digital watch you can now also find some great digital wall clocks which are far more high tech certainly more beautiful than the cheap throwaway watches. Designs vary greatly so if you are interested in getting something nice and unique for your wall then you should be able to find an example that will suit perfectly. From modern, clean and stylish looks to more retro futuristic designs that wouldn’t look out of place on the Bladerunner set.

One of my personal favorites is the Big Time Digital Wall Clock which is certainly trying to look all futuristic with its massive 1m x 0.5m face which will ensure you can tell the time no matter how far you are from these large wall clocks. It looks like something straight out of a science fiction movie and being available in 4 colors means you will be able to get one that fits into your current décor no problem. I have the red one in my bedroom and its looks great.

Generally decorative wall clocks come in every conceivable style, are made of every conceivable material, and can be found to match every conceivable taste. From the most basic institutional style (black numbers and hands against a white face) to the most impossibly complex artisan clocks that are more works of art in their own right than useful devices for telling the time, the range is truly amazing. So too is the price range. Cheap wall clocks can be purchased under five dollars, whereas the most expensive is the “La Machine à Ecrire le Temps” by Jaquet Droz which is more a piece of art than a practical device and sells for $342,275. A few extremely rare antique clocks formerly owned by famous historical figures can sell for even more at auction.

The mechanics of different types of clocks are also extremely diverse. What makes the core mechanics different in types of clocks is the harmonic oscillator, a physical part of the clock that oscillates or vibrates at a precise frequency. This is how the clock tells time. in mechanical clock this is either the balance wheel or a pendulum. Some electric clocks use a tuning wheel. On clocks billed as “Quartz”, it is a piece of quartz crystal inside the clock that serves this function. There are other more arcane devices that accomplish the same thing, but they are not common.

If accuracy and precision is important to you, perhaps you should check into the lines of radio guided atomic wall clocks. Coming in a series of styles, these clocks automatically set themselves and automatically change for daylight saving time adjustments. These electrical clocks have a small radio receiver that receive the current time as set by a cesium atomic clock, the most accurate clock in the world based on the microwave emissions by atoms of the metallic element cesium. The atomic clock is so precise that it only loses one second ever 1.4 million years and serves as the basis for Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). You wall version receives a time update every day and automatically adjusts itself to reflect the exact proper time.