David's Tip of the Day: How to Make A Record Clock

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How to Make A Record Clock
One of the fun things my dad showed me how to do growing up was to make clocks out of pretty much anything. Here’s a real easy one for you that can cool-up any room and show off your favorite players. You can either buy the mechanism by itself or visit your local store (in this case Target) for a clock that has hands that you feel will look cool…

I chose this clock due to the wide silver hands… I knew it would look nice against the record’s black surface and would most likely not clash with the color of any center label . The clock was a whopping $6…

The screws in the back needed to be removed to take this mechanism out…

Here’s the clock face exposed after taking the screws out and removing the glass…

The hands of the clock come off without any tools. Place your fingers directly above the center post (not the side where I’m holding it in this picture… this will bend the hands) and pull straight off. Each of the three hands will come off this way…

Place the hands in the order that you took them off…

Use a wench to loosen the nut. A regular wrench is best, though all I had with me was this crescent wrench and it did the job…

Here are all of the disassembled pieces of the clock mechanism…

When you buy a mechanism for this purpose (from a crafts supply house) there’s a hanging post built in to the mechanism. Since I took this from an existing clock, which had a mounting plate separate from the mechanism, I had to improvise. There are many ways to make this work. In the same box as my household tools I had some electrical tape and picture hanging wire…

The record is very light, so taping the wire directly to the mechanism worked just fine…

For the next part choose a favorite record…

Choose a record for who’s on it as well as the color and design of the center label. Keep in mind the colors of the room you’re placing the clock into…

Place the mechanism in the center hole of the record and hand tighten the nut…

Here she is!