The specifics vary, but the basic story remains the same: The clock has been sitting above your fireplace for years, noted for its punctuality and constant tick-tick-tick.

Then, it stops.

And you're confounded. The clock has always worked. It has been passed down for generations, keeping a place on the wall and letting you know if you're early or late.

How can it just stop?

"No. 1, everybody thinks a clock should run forever," said Richard Bache, a Gainesville resident and owner of Antiquities in Time. He retired from the Air Force more than 30 years ago, and during his service he picked up a passion for collecting clocks.

After retiring, he opened a clock repair shop in town.

"And they don't. People come in, they don't understand it," he continued. "A clock's mechanical. It either runs or it doesn't run."

Bache and his wife started collecting clocks when she saw a "schoolhouse regulator" clock in someone's home. The couple later went out and bought four or five clocks, and as the collection grew, Bache decided he would be better off learning how to fix them, rather than paying someone to do it for him.

Today, he tinkers with his own and other customers' clocks at his shop on Bradford Street in Gainesville. It's part hobby and part work, he says, and he's been doing it long enough that he's selective about which clock projects he takes on.

After starting their clock collection, he was stationed in Germany - "That's a godsend if you're collecting clocks" - and the collection grew even more.

Today, the shop is a collection of metal widgets, kitchen, mantle and tambour clocks and two specific tools Bache uses to keep them all running - a spring winder and a lathe.

In one corner sits an imposing timepiece encased in dark wood. It has four faces, and in Czechoslovakian it tells you the year, day of the week, the date, the season, the stars in the sky and the zodiac sign - oh, and the time, too.

In a glass case is a round back clock about 6 inches wide and heavier than it looks. It is a clock built for a U.S. Navy ship, encased in a thick sturdy black plastic case with a subtle spring on the back that cushions the inner gears from any hits the boat takes.

These are just a few of the hundreds of clocks Bache has collected over the years, and he's repaired more than 1,700 in the decades he's owned his Gainesville shop. But even for someone who admits he fixes clocks for the challenge and not necessarily the money, there's one problem.

"I don't think people care about clocks much anymore," he said. "Everything's electronic. They got watches and phones; how many clocks do you have in your house?"

Often, there's one on your stove, your microwave, maybe even on your cable box.

"You go about your house and see this, that and another, so people don't particularly care for a clock unless it's decorative."

So, when you want to buy a grandfather clock, you look at the size, shape and color of it

But there's much more to a clock than what you see against the wall, Bache said.

"You think a clock is gorgeous because you buy it from the outside in," he said. "I buy a clock from the inside out. I want to see what's unusual about the movement."

And what many clock buyers don't realize, he said, is that clocks require regular maintenance. Just like a car, a clock has parts that require periodic cleaning.

And if you're spending $2,000 on a new grandfather clock, you don't want to think about the possibility of spending another $300 to $500 every few years to keep it working. But that's what it takes.

"If it's my clock, it's probably every three years. But I don't charge myself near as much as I charge the customers," he said. "So I recommend to my customers every five to eight years. But nobody pays attention to that."

And once you get that nice clock home, you have to keep in mind where you put it.

Sure, it may look great at the foot of your stairs by the front door, but you have to consider the effect moisture and foot traffic will have on the clock's gears.

The worst place for a clock, Bache said, is to be in a home with pets that spread hair, children that churn up dirt and a housekeeping regimen that churns up dust every few days. Ironically, the more dusting is done in the house, the more the dust is churned up and settles inside the clock.

Sometimes, the problem is even more severe than a simple cleaning.

"It fell off a mantle and it lost a piece of wire to it," Bache said of the little tambour clock sitting on a nearby table. Tambour clocks are usually seen in mantles and are shaped like Napoleon's hat.

"I said sure, I can fix it, but it's going to take a long time," he said of the work needed to replace the main part of the pendulum. "The length of the pendulum determines whether the clock is fast or slow. ... I've had people come in here with clocks apart. They said, ‘I thought I could fix it - can you fix it?'

"I said sure. That was in my younger days. Now I say, ‘Forget it.'"

Then there's the clock owners who wind and wind their clocks, hoping just one more turn will make it start ticking again. Bache has a string of clock keys with cracks and curved handles from the pressure put on them. "The story is, the clock wasn't going to run."

The little tambour clock continues to tick, its back door open to reveal its brass mechanisms. And as much as Bache needs to focus on the clock's ticking, it's difficult.

"It drives me batty," said the collector of clocks. "That's why I keep the door open, I tell ya.

"We've got 50 clocks hanging on the wall in the house, and we don't run but one or two of them."