Leaderboard

Look closely at the claw on the barrel arbour, as it is designed to grip in one direction. Now hold it against the centre coil of the spring and it will be self evident which way it should go.

Today I set about removing the old paint down to the bare metal. The compass housing will be repainted black as it was originally, but since there was so much paint missing to begin with I thought a full strip down made the most sense. Here's the compass housing following stripping today. It's made of brass but appears to have been silver plated before paint was applied. This is the top of the bowl which houses the compass card. The ring was not painted originally but was plated with silver. Much of the plating came off during cleaning and will need to be replaced. The crystal has been cleaned but the staining remained. I'll need to polish it with some glass polish to remove the stains. I should have some more pics soon!

Usually the red side up. But some movement have the coil in the opposite way. If i hesitate and have forgotten how it should sit i normally find one on google to look at. You can also figure out if you at the barrel arbor.

Old pic for an old watch 6319-5010 Used to look a whole lot worse. Cleaned out half a pound of DNA. Still have to refinish case and maybe bracelet. Sent from my Honor 5c

I'm really liking that Clubman...

This is what I have on tonight... Seiko 7009-3040 - bought it off eBay from thailandsmiles (?). Supposed to be a military model with the secondary hour markers. Keeps great time and has a pretty decent reserve. The crown is really hard to pull out to adjust... I'm certain it needs some cleaning. The lume is extremely limited and pretty faded, and it's extremely light. I almost forget I'm wearing it. I don't know if the folded metal band is original, but it fits the lugs well and looks decent with the watch.

Hello all just wanted to share my latest project watches. The first is a vintage Arnex skeleton movement in a pilot watch case with a white skeleton dial. Waiting to get some chocolate brown ostrich leg straps to finish it. For my second project watch I wanted to make a custom pocket watch. This project was the most time consuming as of yet. The movement needed a new balance staff and whoever poised this one before I left quite a lot of issues. I think I spent about 14 hours getting it poised. I thought I would never finish it but one day it was finally perfect. Anyway, here it is a 992b pocket watch movement in a keystone base metal case and fancy number dial: Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yup [emoji4] Except your example still has the painted numbers around the dial. I have to redo mine. Sent from my Honor 5c

@Delgetti Very nice pictures and a good walk through You keep mentioning that you are an amateur, but in my eyes a very organized one, to say the least ! Looking at the pictures, the way you work, most likely a lot of professionals would have to take a run for their money !!

Here we go with part 2. Now it's easy to note, that I'm not a professional as the cleaning equipment is only... ehm... semi-professional. Special treatment for the balance and the pallet fork. The equipment for oiling and grease. Inserting the new mainspring. Reassembling the train bridge. Surprise: Much easier than on other watches, the parts fall into correct positions by themselves. Nice. Barrel bridge and ratchet system. The keyless works. Assembling and oiling the Pallet fork. The return of the balance. A drop of oil for the balance and escape wheel stones. Winding up and...it runs! Oops, some adjustment needed. Better. Reassembling the automatic device. Inserting the screws for movement and dial. Time for the cannon pinion and the hour wheel. Bringing back dial and hands (oh, I love those Maxi dials). Back in the case... ...and completed with the automatic device. Some grease for the gasket. Got it. It's called a wrist watch, so it's for the wrist not for the safe.