Owl clock

zieak ♦ March 7, 2005 ♦ 4 Comments

Wise are the owls. They should be a good source of information. On a recent Salvation Army supply gathering expedition i left with a $.75 Tomy tick-tock answer clock.

Telling time is an absolute hoot with Tomy’s� Tic-Tock Answer Clock�! Just push the Owl’s left foot to make the minute and hour hands go by- push his right foot, and up fly the Owl’s eyelids to let kids know the time. Whooo would guess that learning to tell time could be such fun?

Well, i thought this toy would be a lot more helpful to me if it actually showed the real time. So i got out the screw drivers and tore into the little guy. Lots of space in his body to squeeze a real clock and i have been hoarding battery powered clocks i find at discount prices. I spent perhaps $.25 on the clock i cannibalized for this project. So now we’re up to $1 in project costs. I didn’t even have to enlarge the hole for the clock mechanism – it fit fine. I did need to use my Dremel tool to trim away some plastic pieces that control his eye number changes – but the foot button that raises his eyelids would still work with the clock guts inside. The problem then became that he stared out of empty rectangular pupils when you pressed his right foot. Not very wise looking. Nor very useful. Well, earlier in the day i came across my little humidity gauge. That went to the humidifier that went to the Salvation Army recently (you reap what you sow). It struck me that the dial on it was about the same size as his eye. Cue the Dremel tool! After 20 minutes of flying plastic chips and the smell of melted plastic and i was supergluing his new eyeball in place. Here he is – you can see that i did a decent job of making a circular opening for the humidity gauge. I didn’t use a pattern – i eyeballed it. Har-har! It is worth noting that i will be finding something different to put on the hands of the clock – something that matches better than these but isn’t quite as chunky as the ones the “clock” came with. And his blue wings will be attached when i’m done with this project too.

And here is a nice close-up of the eyes you can see the empty rectangle that i started with. Cena will look at the drugstore tomorrow for a digital clock for his other eye (although i’d rather put a thermometer in there).