A church near Harrogate has saved itself a £20,000 repair bill for its clock — by using a can of duck oil.

Nidd Church spent £1,500 trying in vain to fix its erratic tower clock but it kept stopping after a day or two.

It was finally quoted £20,000 for the clock to be dismantled and taken to a workshop in Derby for repair.

The church feared the prohibitive cost spelled the end for the two train flatbed clock made by Potts of Leeds, which was installed as a prestige item to show Nidd’s importance in 1880.

The church, photographed by Jane Page

But Knaresborough man Martin Lightfoot, a former engineering lecturer who along with his wife Sue take monthly Mattins services at Nidd, wasn’t convinced.

He reckoned the difficult to reach pulleys needed oiling and volunteered to do the job himself.

A conventional 12ft ladder would not negotiate the tight spiral steps from the ground so Martin volunteered to go up to the clock level, above the pulleys, lie on his front and drip some duck oil through the floorboards and beams onto the pulleys.

The clock was installed in 1880.

Martin said:

“The clock mechanism looked OK but I was suspicious of the pulleys. They looked very dry.

“The clock seems OK now. I’m just hoping that it keeps going.”

The grade two listed Church of St Paul and St Margaret, which is adjacent to Nidd Hall, dates back to 1866.

David Andrews, treasurer, lay reader and organist at the church, said:

“For five weeks now the clock has run and kept good time. For how long we can’t tell, but it’s doing better than ever before.”

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