Overview[edit]

Keys of various sizes for winding up mainsprings on clocks

Mechanism of a Wall Clock, Ansonia Co. 1904

Often power for the device is stored within it, via a winding device that applies mechanical stress to
an energy-storage mechanism such as a mainspring, thus involving some form of escapement; in
other cases, hand power may be utilized. The use of wheels, whether linked by friction or gear teeth,
to redirect motion or gain speed or torque, is typical; many clockwork mechanisms have been
constructed primarily to serve as visible or implicit tours de force of mechanical ingenuity in this area.
Sometimes clocks and timing mechanisms are used to set off explosives, timers, alarms and many
other devices.

Examples[edit]
The most common examples are mechanical clocks and watches. Others include:

 Wind-up toys – often as a simple mechanical motor, or to create automata. These may be either
key-wound, as were many 20th-century model trains, or a simpler pullback motor.
 Most leaf shutters use a clockwork mechanism not unlike that of wristwatches to time the
opening and closing of the shutter blades.
 Mechanisms to turn the lens of lighthouses before electric motors.
 Mechanical calculators, used before electronic computers were developed around World War II.
Among the most complex were Babbage's difference and analytical engines, which were
mechanical versions of computers.
 Astronomical models, such as orreries whose history spans hundreds of years.
 Music boxes, which were very popular during the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th.
 Almost all phonographs built before the 1930s.
 Hand-powered electrical equipment, such as a clockwork radio, where an energy-storing spring
accounting for much of the size and weight of the device spins a much smaller
electric generator; such equipment is very popular where batteries and mains power (house
current) are scarce.

Movement of a grandfather clock with striking mechanism

Clockwork music box

Exhibition model of an alarm clock mechanism with two mainsprings (black spirals)

Charles Babbage's Difference Engine No.1, in Science Museum, London. The first computer.

Plastic clockwork motor of a modern kitchen timer