Bob J
I did some digging on the web and found this:
I was visting with a local small performance engine builder yesterday to check out his flow bench and while there asked him if he knew what the "Casting Clock" means. He said yes, as a matter of fact he did. He explained that he knows an owner of an aluminum foundry and posed the same question of him at one time. The foundry owner told him that it refers to the bulk number of mold forming cycles that that particular pattern has made in the foundry. One of the functions of the clock is to identify when it needs to be returned to the pattern shop for routine maintenance. Another may be for help in identifing castings during quality control problems, and I suppose this could actually be its sole purpose. Supposedly the patterns wear during use from the abbrasiveness of the sand, thus altering the thickness of the casting. The clock helps identify a basic point in the patterns cycle life when it was used to make a casting mold. Evidently it is quite common to use other marks for this as well, like a line of dots, which is what this foundry owner uses.
It would be interesting to know approximately how many units are represented by each dot or number. The DIF castings I have (or the ones I have looked at) show 7 dots, whereas the MCC castings show the numbered clock with the five odd numbers. I suppose its possible that since all the foundries were a little different that the clock may represent a different number of units depending on where it was cast. I've read that in the 20's that they would cast as many as 10,000 Model T blocks in a day at DIF. They sure didn't mess around!! It would be interesting to know what the average number of FE's cast in a day was by foundry.
The rest is here,
https://www.fordfe.com/casting-clock-possible-explaination-t11904.html dp
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