I bought an old Junghans wall clock yesterday, not knowing whether or not it worked.
I only paid 200 DKK for it (34 USD/21£), so I figured that if it needed repairs, I could afford it.
The most amazing thing in my eyes was that the key for winding up the clockwork was still there.
It was dirty and dusty, and the brass thingies needed a loving hand as you can see:
Well - at least I could do something about the dirt and stuff, so I did.
After a thorough clean-up and polishing, it ended up looking like this:
I then hung it in my little hallway instead of the usual mirror to see if the thing would actually work.
It took quite a bit of adjustment to make it run properly; the pendulum has to be timed so that the tick-tock sound completely even, that way the clock will run as it should.
After a few tries, I got the pendulum to run well, and - ta-daaaaaaaaa!
The clock works just fine.
And I totally love the very quiet, soft tick-tock sound that it's got, it is really nice.
I'd say that it's almost a cosy sound.
The clock only loses 3-4 minutes for every 24 hours, and I'd say that it's definitely acceptable for such an old clock.
Now all I need is to find a glazier that can put in a small piece of thin glass in front of the clock face, that's all the fixing it needs.
And that ought to be affordable.
Edit: Hmmm, if I move the pendulum up on the rods it's attached to, it ought to gain a few minutes, since the distance it has to swing is shorter, thus making the clock go a little faster...*thinks*...that's worth a try.
Apart from that, another of my local thrift shops had a brand new guitar tuner/digital metronome for sale, 10 DKK! (- that's a little under 2 USD)
Whoohoo, snatch!
Then I've got a tuner for my acoustic guitar as well.