How do you design a clockworks mechanism - like a gear train?

For a layperson, the book "My Own Right Time: An Exploration of Clockwork Design" by Philip Woodward would be a good choice. However, it is expensive. You can oreview the book on Amazon.

As an alternative, the following horological website has a number of valuable links that can assist you (and its free!):

http://www.horology.com/

Good luck!!!

Decide on the final shaft speed you want, and pick a motor (or gear-motor) speed for the drive. From there some math becomes unavoidable, but the basic formula is simple:

S2/S1 = T1/T2

where S stands for the shaft speed and T the number of teeth on the gears. Since you are making gears, T1 and T2 must be integers, and each must be greater than 2

You are also talking about multiple shafts, so you need to apply the formula to each set of gears.

S3/S2 = T2/T3, and so forth

Note that all these ratios multiply to get your final ratio.

I can tell you that clockwork is tremendously complicated and must be very precise, but you probably already know that. i have one of the "for idiots" books on clockwork, and i enjoyed it very much finding it to a be a very useful tool.