Building My Dream Digital Clock: DIY 7 Segment Display with a Cute Robot Twist! -- Episode 600

Perhaps have the e14 little blue robots either side that dance when the screen robot looks at them.

I think someone tried to replace the clockwork mechanism with a motor at one point, so there should be an exploded view somewhere already. 

Could keep the clockwork and just drive it via a clutch mechanism though. Motor via gearbox winds the spring then clutch disengages when it is time to dance. This would make it easier to mount as you could use the wind up key shaft and the lower screw. Clutch will also allow the spring to unwind fully if left to run down, so that you know how much to wind it up each time.

Simpler still, If you don't want the clutch then you can reverse the motor direction as in this case you can back-drive the clockwork mechanism and even control its speed whilst doing so.

I like the robot idea!

I know I had one here, but not sure if my kids stole it from me. I'll see if I can retrieve it back!

Just had an idea of a clock where on the hour a door opens and the little man is behind dancing away, I think that might be cool too!

The cuckoo clocks I have seen tend to be quite ornate, which is something that has perhaps been lost by going digital. No fancy weights, pendulums, bellows or carved mountain chalet style enclosures. 

A  a clock that I've always liked is the 'DCF77 Analyzer/Clock' by Erik de Ruiter
 https://projecthub.arduino.cc/edr1924/a13a0b1a-e11e-414a-91e1-0646cf5e3ec9

Nice balance between the functionality and the presentation. To me, it's the digital equivalent of leaving the covers off to see the mechanism working away inside.

You could perhaps do the weather house style clock where the 'rain man' or 'sun woman' comes out depending on the weather forecast. The animation screen could be kept behind the doors or you may want to incorporate the doors into the animation.

Was thinking about this some more and a common theme to the more traditional cuckoo clocks tends to be the incorporation of a miniature 3D diorama scene. Either scenic with trees, mountains and wildlife or with waterwheels and woodchoppers, some of which are animated.

With your current design, then you might be able to replace this idea with an edge-lit multi-layered laser-engraved scene instead. Either as a raster engraving of a more traditional scene as in a diorama piece or alternatively as simple line art graphics such as robots and electronics symbols and stuff like that. By controlling the edge lighting of each of the layers you can animate it via colour and brightness. Each layer can be comprised of separate laser-cut pieces so you could have multiple objects on each layer plane that can be illuminated separately, which would reduce the number of layers and overall depth required.

Wow, I like that idea. I've seen individual laser engraved edge lit panels, but using multiple to make a scene and making it appear animated sounds amazing.
I think I really need to try and get myself a laser cutter!

The DCF77 clock is amazing, I've never seen that before.
I like the idea of the weather house style clock too, I'd forgotten about clocks like that, but now remember we had one like it when I was little (believe it was a holiday gift from a ski resort somewhere)

The DCF77 clock is amazing, I've never seen that before.
I like the idea of the weather house style clock too, I'd forgotten about clocks like that, but now remember we had one like it when I was little (believe it was a holiday gift from a ski resort somewhere)