In a Nutshell
Just in time for Raymond Loewy's 120^th birthday I finished restoring one of his most remarkable iconic designs, this Canadian Westinghouse 1931 Grandmother Clock Radio, called the "Columaire". The combination of a 8-tube radio and a New Haven Westinghouse automatic control electric clock is as good as it ever can get: all original, serviced aligned and working, in mint cosmetic condition

Introduction:
Raymond Fernand Loewy [Nov. 5, 1893 – July 14, 1986] was an American industrial designer born in France (ref.1). The "Man who shaped America" and one of the "thousand makers of the 20th century" designed everything from cutlery and fine china, over many company logos, to cars, locomotives and air planes. And - yes - radios: Colonial "New World" Globe 702 (1933), Hallicrafters SX-42 (1946), Emerson 520 catalin (1946), Emerson 511, 517, 541 "Moderne" (1947), Emerson 561A (1949). And - yes - this Westinghouse "Columaire", in 1931 as a 38 years old (pict.46). He calls it an "ornamental design" (pict.47), but what a difference between his design and the conventional grandfather clock radios of the time (pict.48)! The skyscraper resemblance is caused by the extremely small real-estate requirement of one square foot, compared with its height of 5 feet. And the dial is on the side, out of sight, yet within easy reach. Here we have the Canadian version model 801, which differs in some details from its US counterpart model WR-8 (ref.2): the cabinet is 6" shorter (54"), as is the later Columaire 10, and the chassis is taken from contemporary compact designs of table-top radios by General Electric (S-22 Junior, also for sale), RCA ("Superette" R7) and the later "Columette" WR-10A, whereas the US model uses the incomparably heavier and bulkier two-piece chassis of a 1930 RCA Radiola 82 console. Not only is the Canadian chassis service-friendlier, but also a much healthier living space for the 3 main tubes, the two push-pull 45's and the 80 rectifier, that reside in a vertical position (no wire sagging) on the best ventilated top (pict.s 15-22). A 8" field coil speaker complements the radio part of this Columaire (pict.s 28-30).
The automatic control clocks on all these sets were made by Westinghouse [technically "New Haven Westinghouse"] (ref.3, "the most complex electric clock movement, even more so than Revere chiming clocks") and are the adequate complement to the exquisite cabinet design. Two features of this clock are very unique (details under techies below):
     a. the second hand moves in one second steps and even makes acoustic tics, like a mechanical clock
     b. a sophisticated power fail mechanism is implemented, by far outperforming the famous Telechron red dot

Additional information:
ref.1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Loewy
ref.2: http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/11785630_a-raymond-loewy-columaire-walnut-skyscraper-radi
ref.3: http://clockhistory.com/newhavenwestinghouse/index.html
ref.4: http://www.antiqueradios.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=217969
ref.5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mT3hRmtpqc
ref.6: http://www.antiqueradios.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=224734

About my Columaire:
The Columaire is in mint condition, both cosmetically and technically. The cabinet has its original finish, except a little piece of veneer at the very bottom of the front panel, that had to be replaced because of edge damage. The cabinet's back has notches for a back plane, which almost all Columaires are missing. After long forum discussions (ref.4) a back plane from 1/8" masonite was recreated with the proper holes and top vent. The chassis has been cleaned and serviced, all tubes replaced by selecting appropriate brands and best performance exemplars from my stock. The filter caps had been replaced by a former owner, the line cord and plug are original (pict.38). A RCA plug (pict.27) for connecting cell phones, mp3 players, etc. has been wired in according to pict.43. The original New Haven Westinghouse automatic control clock has been totally disassembled, cleaned with alcohol, reassembled and lubricated (pict.s 31-37). It works flawlessly and accurately. A youtube video has been created (click on thumbnail 49, or go to ref.5), concentrating on the electrical clock and cell phone replays, since AM reception here in Chilliwack is lousy. Please e-mail me (Kris) for any questions, ich spreche Deutsch, je parle Français.

For the techies only:
a. the clock's second hand moves in one second steps and even makes acoustic tics, like a mechanical clock. A 60 Hz motor drives a 36 pole rotor with pairs (2) of stators (pict.33), to rotate the rotor at 60/36 times 2 = 3 1/3 Hz = 200 rpm. The inner 15 teeth gear drives a 100 teeth fiber wheel at 15/100 times 3 1/3 = 1/2 Hz, and the two pin lantern pinion divides this by 2, which results in 1Hz ticks. The tick sound is generated by a little cylindrical hammer falling down
b. the Telechron "red dot" indicated that power has been lost some time ago, and the clock doesn't work anymore and would have to be restarted. In this automatic control New Haven clock an independent mechanical timer is started, when power is lost, interrupted when power is restored to let the clock resume where it stopped, and timing out after a preselected interval of a few minutes, after which the clock would not start again, when power is coming back. So, if you see your clock working, you know that it is keeping the correct time to within the interval you had preselected (here anywhere between a few seconds and 3 minutes). Thus your clock is able to survive several power failures, as long as their accumulated time is within the preselected interval. There are many misconceptions of this mechanism, leading owners to declare their clock as dead, discard them and replace them by cheap Chinese battery clocks, whereas they simply forgot to reload the timer by pushing the little lever near "12" a little to the left (pict.36). Incidentally this vital need to access the clock face (remember that in the 1930's power failures were as frequent as April rain showers) is the very reason this clock never had a clock glass, although these days you can have one if you want (ref.6).

Here are the specifications:

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