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Waltham PW Mainspring Disassemble


MrBeat

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Happy New Year All :)

 

Well its a good start to the year and ive already come unstuck.

I don't usually work on American watches but i have a Waltham that requires a new mainspring and ordinarily this is a non issue but i can not see how the barrel comes apart to change it as it seems stuck in place ? Does the barrel arbour get punched out ? I can not for the life of me see how to get this out it seem intent on staying in ?

 

Any help with pointing out my obvious error will be most appreciated, Photos Below >

 

DSC00336.jpgDSC00337.jpgDSC00338.jpg

 

It appears theres play but the thing does not want to come apart, am i missing a secret here ?

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Well the penny dropped :D

Turns out the arbour is a two piece that screws together, although this one had ceased and just needed an extra umppfff to get her to release. Apparently this is a common assembly on Walthams of 19 Jewels ( this case a Cresent Street ), a small and old picture on the interwebs from Waltham shows the assembly which is why it had me baffled for a moment.

 

Now the parts are cleaning before new spring is fitted, problem solved :)

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  • 4 months later...

@MrBeat @oldhippy I'm in the middle of replacing am mainspring on a Waltham 12s and I'm having similar trouble.  I thought maybe the plate held the assembly together, but it's near impossible to install without the mainspring lifting the cover slightly off the barrel, unseating the pivot.  I had no trouble getting the arbor out though, this one appears to feed through the assembly, but there is no means to keep everything captured prior to installation.  Really stumped here.  

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