Antique Clock Start Stop Automation

The antique clock from my grandmother has a unique sound. It's bells are resonating through the house. Unfortunately, not all it's residents can enjoy the sound of clock bells during the night, so we stopped the clock in the evening and started it again in the morning. Since this was often forgotten, the clock was not always running and in other cases it was necessary to fast-forward to the correct time. Luckily, the design of the clock allowed for a rig that could automate the start and stop procedure.

The rig contains a stepper motor to start and stop the pendule from clock. The control is performed by an AVR Atmega8. The latter might be a bit overqualified for the job, but it has the advantage of having a timer that can be clocked from an external crystal, so it is easy to make it an accurate clock using a simple watch-crystal (32.768kHz).