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1974 Bulova on the original bracelet.

Well. I've done it. It's on its way. A staking set Made a silly offer on ebay and the seller accepted. I'm over the moon. Will keep you posted on its arrival. Will do a full clean, as did 'watch with mike' YouTube video. Wohoo! Thank you for the like Richard. Can you feel how excited I am? Saddo or what?

The two jewel ISA 1198 based " Montine of Switzerland" "Swiss Quartz" arrived, and It looks completely unworn. However the original battery had destroyed the lower battery contact. Bizarrely it hadn't corroded, in a conventional manner, but rather it had split into a number of thin strips. I fabricated a replacement (from a 10K ohm resistor leg, flattened in the vice), and now it is running perfectly.

After my defeat at the hands of the Rocar I decided to try another, an Orient. After battling with the pallet fork, balance, date finger wheels (the horrible plastics ones), putting on new dial feet, crystal, crown, winding stem and second hand (ship of Theseus??) I finally managed to get it up and running. Wearing it into work today after a first pass at the regulation after assembly, I'll tweak it tonight, but seems to be running well.... So far. Black strap is just temporary, thinking of getting a grey one as permanent one... Any thoughts?

Working on a Rocar (Ebauches Bettlach Cal. 8135) which is really putting my Padawan skills to the test - "I am no Jedi yet". However I think I may have spotted 2 issues, the first being a mangled hairspring: Usually I would have walked away from this, but decided to 'give it a go' and it ended up like this: Quite proud of myself Here is issue number 2.... can you spot it: Replaced the jewel using my jewelling tool (another first!) Lets hope those were the last of the surprises!

Today I've been wearing my newly serviced "Services" with the Smiths Cal 627. I new nothing about the Smiths factory at Ystradgynlais making "cheap" watch movements until I got this. This is a rare(ish) 17J and runs better than I ever imagined it would. After running overnight, I've warn it all day, including a round of golf (a challenge for any watch) and after 24h it's +2s. Amazing for such a cheap watch. I wrote about it here

Good man you are. I'm now at my skill level where I am going to try to repair mangled balance springs. Microscope at the ready. Well actually in a few days. Can't concentrate to well after a tooth extraction and infection . Hence watching Youtube and reading 'Talk' posts.

Ok, Im not sure if this is appropriate for this forum so, mods, please remove it if it should not be here. But, I made a strap! I recently bought a "nice" watch from Japan and wanted to put a decent quality strap on it. My only problem is that Im not sure what constitutes "decent quality" for any given price point. So I figured how hard could it be to make my own?! A few YouTube videos and a peruse of ebay and I had the equipment and (hopefully) the knowhow to give it a go. Now, don't get me wrong, it is rough, and I have no idea if it will hold up but it is my first attempt so I still consider it an achievement!

I haven't worn this for a few months, so I figured it was time to give it an airing. A Felsa 790 series "Orfilux" 25 Rubis Automatic from around 1955, in a "Hermetica Garantie" case. RWAG is most likely the case maker Rodi & Wienenberger AG, Pforzheim Germany. (Translated link). Sadly RWAG appears to have ceased trading around 2019. I can find nothing on line regarding the "Orfilux" brand, but I suspect it may have been a German company, using Swiss movements. If anyone else knows anything about "Orfilux" I would be keen to hear. I cleaned and serviced this on November 30th 2019 and it is still going strong, though I suspect that is more a testament to the quality of the caliber than it is to my amateur servicing efforts. It also probably helps that this is not a "daily driver", and that thus far I have resisted the urge to pull it all apart again and "fix" the hands, a process that might be fraught with possible pitfalls. The "patina" (some might call it rust) on the hands, isn't obvious unless you shoot a macro shot of it and post it on line, so when I'm wearing it, I can live with it. I should really sort it out by polishing and reluming the hands, but I'm happy enough to leave well alone for the time being. Maybe next time it needs a service, the I will be unable to resist the urge.

It is a Breguet hairspring. What you see is no touching but the coil in 2nd level (over main level). It needs to be centered without balance wheel, hairspring mounted in cock. However surely not recommended for unexperienced repairers! Frank

Just for the day Seiko 6119 6000

Tressa Automatic 1970s ETA 2788 Running at 0 to +0.5 SPD in wear. Replaced crystal, crown (original crown worn and too small to wind effectively) and day wheel (plastic had gone very crumbly on the underside). Also badly chipped jewel on train wheel bridge (replaced entire bridge as easier than changing the jewel). Very good movement running at over 300 degrees DU/DD. All positions 0 SPD except PR, PU +2 SPD.

here is the catalog reference

Ok, so in the end I got this Boley set in really immaculate condition. Can be used in the inverted style and has the ubiquitous 4.7mm sized stakes. 250 Euro (incl shipping). Only a few elements are missing (and I don't need the reamers that could be in the front right - I have them in my Seitz press). I'm happy. Now I just need to find good use for it

Elgin Briar from 1954

My buddy Ed wanted a black dial watch. Since we are not the sort that would be able to afford a thousands of dollars or tens of thousands of dollars watch. We thought to get some Musou paint and try to whack something out. I think it turned out pretty nice.

You won’t find an original willard or a decent dd in the US for under $1k. I think the willard repros are scarce now, too. A good A-11 can still be had for $300 a good A-17 for 500- get one of those yourself and make sure the company treats you! One of the hard shell militaries, Benrus et al will be a good choice, too… …and sorry to continue to veer ot but since the pics have been light here this week and if we’re talking tomorrow’s watch of today and something a bit more military, some visuals for one I hoped to have been posting by now… …got it to here yesterday, still much to be done…I’ll write it up in the more appropriate place…but what do y’all make of that dial?

Hi All, I thought I would share where I am up to with my latest project. While doom-scrolling Ebay I came across a soon-to-end auction for tidy looking Bulova Accutron 2181 and chanced a bid. The seller was upfront that the seconds hand turned but the minute and hour hands did not move. I had already read elsewhere that this was a common problem and figured I should be able repair or at least replace the seized parts. This is my first Accutron... The project is a simple stainless steel dress watch with a silver face and simple baton hour markers. Should look nice on a black leather strap. On first inspection after opening the case it is obvious there has been a battery leak. It looks mostly contained to one area and Im hoping it will clean up. I checked the "fingers" and while dirty, they look ok. So far so good! I started by disengaging the fingers from the index wheel - apparently any rough handling during hand removal can cause these to break. Once I had stripped the dial side down I came across the reason why the hands were not moving. Indeed the canon pinion had seized - and properly so! The minute wheel teeth had been striped! After wrestling the centre wheel away from the movement it was clear it had rusted solid and the previous owner had attempted to free it up using force applied to the crown. I used a bit of Rodico to clean up the rust and teeth before proceeding as the forks are magnetised and will attract any ferrous material. Also of note virtually all the components were magnetised to some degree or other so will need to deal with that. A couple of shots showing just how thin the coil wires actually are! I finally made it down to the tuning fork and got stuck trying to remove one of the two screws holing it to the plate. I was putting significantly more force in to turning that screw head than I was comfortable with so decided to place a drop of penetrating oil around the screw in the hopes it will have loosened up by the morning. Now I need to start looking for some replacement parts...... I will update this thread as I progress!

Here are some. Lots of Pike we released...not gonna filet one unless that is all I can catch. Some Walleye, and one lake Trout.

No. Was set at £175. I got it for 64%. I'm happy with that. I know it's early, but It was (is) my Christmas and New year present. Can't buy anything now until February 2024. But think of the fun I can have till then. Oh gosh, I'm a tool Saddo.

I've got a couple watches lined up in addition to the one I posted about in the Newbie repairer category -- waiting for my confidence to arrive. Not a huge investment, but I'd like to give them the attention they deserve, and hopefully once I get inside, they deserve the attention I give them! Something about having a small queue makes me feel a bit more urgency in getting stuck in.

The movement is an ETA 6498-1 which is actually one of the movements commonly recommended for beginners to start with as it is relatively simple and relatively large. That being said if this is your very first attempt at watch mechanicing it would be wise to acquire a couple of junkers first to practice stripping down and rebuilding before you embark on this one if it has any value to you (monetary or sentimental) It sounds to me like the keyless works are out of sync. This could be relatively simple to sort out but involves uncasing the movement and removing the dial and hands so that you can get at the keyless works.

Mostly they go in the bin. Occasionally if it is interesting, unusual or unused, then I may take the time to clean it and re-use it. I also tend to save interesting buckles and such like, to put on to fresh leather. I figure cleaning metalwork is a lot simpler and safer than trying to fumigate well worn old leather. Leather is pretty tough stuff though, so a little diluted bleach and a lot of scrubbing goes a long way. Rejuvenation with neetsfoot oil or leather rejuvenation products can work wonders.

Another Army pattern on its way. This time a Timor, that makes a count of four. I'm hoping the strap is an original army issue.

I need this tool for my watch bench!!!

Now that is an understatement! The above will get you 80% there with only 20% of the headache. Start off simple and then you can develop your own best practices and arsenal of exotic oils/greases/epilames/Lubeta..... and oilers to chase those elusive final few degrees of amplitude. Perfection is expensive to approach and impossible to achieve!

I got this magnet tool at a local hardware store. Has a 12" wide head. Meant to pickup nuts, bolts, nails, and so on in a workshop or work site, but works well on finding steel watch parts. With the telescoping handle, I don't even need to get down on my hands and knees.

the precision is more of a quality factor of the particular lathe not necessarily its size. It's commonly thought of by people that if you want to make something small you need a small tool. But small tools have disadvantages they don't have necessarily the strength or mass in other words they tend to flex and not be stable versus something big. but a lot of it depends upon what you're doing with the lathe general turning small lathe would be fine what about some other task like gear cutting on the watchmaker's life is at a good thing or not? I swiped an image out of the book that's your standard gear cutting set up for the watchmaker's lathe. Fits all the requirements tiny gears tiny lathe but what's the problem? the basic layout of the gear cutting here whether it is a watchmaker's lathe or something much much bigger more or less looks identical or at least can look identical. The difference is the bigger lathe having way more mass the holder for the spinning gear cutting just tends to be way way more stable than something like this which can flex depending upon how much pull the belts put on it. so a lot of it just depends upon what you're doing big tends to be more stable.

A tg obviously can't take account of all the variables of a wrist worn watch for different people's lifestyles. Apart from the diagnostic side , its just a quick convenient device to get you in the ballpark. After all these were originally just used by professional watchmakers to get the watch back on the customers wrist and the wmaker paid up quickly with a fair chance of returning an accurately running watch. Its only in fairly recent times that they've become cheap enough and available to everyone and their dog. Your time and effort to set up an individual's watch should yield much better averaging accuracy. So besides the fault finding which should help with preventing wear and tear much like the plug in diagnostic machine of a car to pinpoint arising issues, the tg is a quick convenient way to regulate time. I still would need mine to be prised from my cold dead fingers

I have been keeping my eyes open for a decent looking jacot for a long time but was reluctant to spend what good Steiner go for. This arrived today, German I believe, the makers mark on the box is GJL so a bit of research is in order. The box ends need a liberal application of PVA but apart from that it is all in very good condition, really pleased. Tom

Yes I noticed that invisible hairspring? It's an American pocket watch it's there it just isn't like a Swiss watch. Yes the rust looks extensive ill be interesting to see what it looks like under the dial. Maybe you should start with reading exercise like a book you can download it in a variety of formats https://archive.org/details/TM9-1575 Providing I got the serial number right this should Be your movement looks like it's a 16 size for some reason the picture looks smaller? Oh and regarding the picture you want to remove the dust ring because when the dust ring is in place you cannot get to the dial screws. https://pocketwatchdatabase.com/search/result/elgin/14501378 Then be careful with the crown wheel screw it's probably Left-hand thread. Typically are but not always.

Today another 2 military watches arrived. An unsigned dial Enicar ATP and a Rotary. Collection is slowly growing. To date the Record WWW my prized precious, and ATPs Cortebert Enicar and Rotary. Good day today, I'm broke for the month but happy .

I have been buying watches to work on and putting aside the automatics until I felt I was ready for the next challenge. This weekend I managed to turn a non-working watch with a deformed (melted? crystal) into a working watch that looks pretty good! I did some research of servicing automatics and found that in addition to what I had previously done I would need to service the self winding mechanism and do something different with the mainspring / barrel. Before starting bought some 8213 breaking grease and some Lubeta V105. I then selected a watch from the handful of automatics I had bought from eBay. I was looking for one that I cared less about about but that seemed complete. The one I selected would run for at least a few seconds after being shaken, I could wind it manually, set the time and the date flipped over every 24 hours. The case was in pretty good condition but the crystal was useless. Inside the watch has an AS 1701 movement with gold(en) plates. There were a few surprises. First I found that inside the barrel there was not an automatic mainspring but instead a blued steel standard mainspring set inside a brake spring. I tried to find what to do with this and found a thread on this site discussing what oil to use on the barrel wall. I eventually followed the advice here and used D5 on the barrel wall before struggling to put the brake spring back in with my fingers. I have no idea how you are supposed to properly install the brake spring - but it is too short and has no eye for a mainspring winder to help... Later when I found the technical communication I found it says "special grease for brake spring" - guess I should have used my new 8213 grease? Anyway it doesn't appear to be slipping too early but I am measuring now how long it will run for when not worn. The eye on the old mainspring broke as I put it in the mainspring winder - so I replaced it with new (NOS) one that I had in a selection I was given. The replacement was not 100% right... The technical communication says to use one with H. 1.18 - 1.20 mm T 0.105mm L. 335mm. I found one with the right thickness and length that was 1.3mm high. It seems to fit into the barrel with some clearance and it seems to be working (perhaps I should order and replace it with the right one?!) The other surprise was the automatic device - the technical communication did not talk about dipping the pawl winding wheels in Lubeta but instead said to lubricate them with "Very fluid oil" - I used a very small amount of the thinnest oil I have which is 9010 but am a little worried that this is going to get flung all over the movement and perhaps I should have dipped them? After cleaning and reassembling I found it still did not run for more than a few seconds.... I found 2 problems. 1. The balance spring was bunching together on one side and was bent out of shape near to where the end curve begins. I loosened the screw holding the stud and with the balance wheel still attached gently stroked the hairspring back into shape so that the stud would drop straight back into place while the hairspring remained centred. This seemed to do the trick but I believe the end curve is still not right 2. The centre wheel did turn freely I discovered that the centre wheel was made up of 2 parts - a wheel that is friction fit to a pivot / tube. The wheel was not totally perpendicular to the tube. I don't have a staking set or staking block but found I could using the base plate as a staking block I could push down on the top of the centre wheel pinion with my tweezers (much like putting a canon pinion back on) and get the wheel to sit correctly. After doing this and putting the centre wheel and centre wheel cock back in place the wheel turned much more freely. With the case cleaned I replaced the crystal with a new one (without a cyclops). I wore the watch and after 24 hours it seem to have gained about 1 min. It is far from perfect but a LOT better than when I first got it. Here are some photos... Before - After - Movement - tg-timer

On my wrist. This was the first watch on which a managed to do a full service. It was advertised as a 'Sekonda'. On arrival the dial displayed 'Quest'. The indexes were damaged. Non runner. The case is from the 'Quest'. The Slava 2427 movement is from the 'Quest'. The dial is as you can see, is from an automatic Sekonda. This is my 'wear most days watch'.

Just to update, I managed to broach out the old pendant tube to the threads and then managed to clean out the threads well enough with a tap and then screw the new pendant tube in without any issues. A bit scary but it certainly works and it looks really nice(:

The annoying thing with contact angle is it's not really the angle lets the problem. In the old days the Swiss used to put a technical sheet in their little tiny can that has their little tiny bottle of oil so somewhere I have a tech sheet on 9010 and another one on 9020 and in that literature it had the contact angle. For which I find fascinating because 9010 has a habit of spreading without epilam so every single reference we have the 9010 basically says use epilam or it will spread. But the 90 20th from my own experience does not spread seems the last forever it is absolute perfect and that wasn't a big difference in contact angle but there was a difference but who knows where I put the technical sheets because for one thing in order to fold up into something that tiny is printed on really thin paper so I put it someplace safe and in a house safe things go Fortunately it looks like the title were discussing horological oil and I believe somebody asked her made a reference to what is horological oil so I have some images. For instance here's one it looks promising unfortunately it doesn't have a date now thanks to the Swiss we have to be concerned about the data the oil This one looks promising although I prefer the second version at least it's priced right Other advertisements Now the next one is interesting because people have questions like what makes a good lubrication for horology. Tells us a little about the different types of oils of why some were good some more bad. Although the definition a good is interesting in that organic oils tend to lubricate better than synthetic except that in life is not there. Then we get a nice list of all the properties were supposed to have minus other stuff that would be interesting. The Elgin watch company produced a magazine for their employees. In the old days companies might have a newspaper for the employees the day whatever it is would be all online but Elgin had a magazine with Elgin related stories in all sorts of other interesting stuff. Here's one on lubrication 1948 1955 article A little hard to read unfortunately but still interesting and it makes a reference to another Elgin oil that you've never seen something for the military.

Cyanoacrylate does react with acrylic crystal, makes them fog up, reacts with anything plastic in close proximity easily. Sometimes after it has set.

I was advised on this forum not to use super glue. It gives off gasses wich fog the crystal and probably won't do the movement any good either.

In case anyone is wondering. I found a great article on Dave's Watch Parts that describes how to replace the pusher in a hunter pocket watch with diagrams and an example. Just look on his page at the bottom or use this direct link to get the PDF. It does require a lathe to do this. While I have one I don't have a motor for it yet.

The normal classic rule in watch repair is not to modify the watch to fit the part. Because someday somebody might replace a balance staff and wonder why they're having an issue because somebody modified the watch to fit their situation as opposed to just fixing the problem in the first place. Of course you do have to identify what the problem actually is.. Then just a reminder what does the balance jewel look like and why your shoulder will never ever touch the jewel if it does your having a serious problem. Now that you see with the jewel looks like let's see what your pivots are supposed to look like in the jewels As you can see normally it should be impossible for anything other than the pivot itself to touch the jewels if the cone shaped Part of pivot is touching the pivot is way too short and the balance staff should be replaced. Oh and when you're looking at the pivots notice how the ends are only slightly rounded. If your balance staff pivot has ends that somebody polished nice and round to reduce the friction you end up with too much amplitude on the ends in the pivot versus the sides and it leads to goofy timing because you have huge amplitude differences. The typically the balance pivot is just slightly rounded. Usually when you're seeing dial up and down amplitude issues in addition to the jewels in the usual thing you look at the pivots are they shaped identical. Or in the case of pocket watches if you look in you see a winking affect. Often times of the watches been dropped the pivot will have a flat spot and when you look in the flat spot catches the light it winks at you not a good thing at all. Oh and remember the golden rule of not modifying the watch? Here's an example somebody has modified your watch notice the items I circled if you look carefully somebody has pushed on the metal to raise it up just a little bit because they probably change the balance staff and that was a hair too long.Which as I said modifying the watch leads to confusion for future watch repair

The set has a rather strange assortment of punches. For instance the things with the plastic on top they are far too new for this set. Seeing as how they all have Springs on them they almost look like something for putting hands-on?. Then it looks like the table itself the discoloration looks like rust damage. Then usually things like the micrometer head are used for mistaking sets that are used to push jewels in but this one does not have the lever for that. Perhaps some somebody opened up the instructions it might tell but I have a suspicion that does not come with the set.

Holy dumba$$ Batman... There IS a circlip. I had another closer look from the side, and lo and behold.... It's a tiny silver clip at the base of the brass collar. I couldn't see it from above. Boy do i feel silly. Thanks @mikepilk and @RichardHarris123 Still, i'm glad i posted and did NOT try to force the wheel. Another problem solved thanks to you guys and this forum!

Here is the Cortebert engine and a spare movement for it with an inca balance. Don't you just love those brass bushings the jewels are set into . Beautiful .

Not technically in the mail but this has just arrived to me. A nice little gem i thought to continue my collection of military watches. This is a Cortebert made ATP watch, one of the forerunners of the WWW designated MOD watches. One of 17 or so brands, i think its around mid rarity of the ATPS, kicking myself a little as a few weeks ago i let a Grana slip through my hands and also another watch with the same movement as the Grana, for not a great deal more than this. This Cortebert has softened the blow, good condition in a stainless case and ticks away nicely.

With just the fork installed, no power, it should move easily with a light puff of air. Then, as you have already checked the balance freedom, check with fork in no power (without escape wheel would be best). As said, no oil on the pivots, peg the jewels, no oil on the roller jewel (!), make sure the fork slot that interacts with the jewel is dead clean, also have a look at the roller jewel, they sometimes are grimy even after cleaning. While the lock does look a bit heavy, there's a whole checklist of things to examine before considering moving a/both stones or adjusting the bankings.

Update. Testing on a Junghans B20 and I have no idea what the beat rate SHOULD be. My table only has the B10. I am using my watch amplifier for now.

Replace the spring. Windles clock oil is the best you can use, as far as I know they only make one type. Cutting springs down when the ends have broken is bad practice, for starters you shorten the spring so the spring might not do its job in having the length it needs to run the clock or work the strike. The spring is old so it will not work so well as a new one. Priory one, never heard of it in my days that is why I always used Horolene but I think they both do the same type of job. With Horolene make sure you have good ventilation.

I picked up this 033 75 Timex automatic at an antiques fair this morning in a lot with 2 other watches. This one is completely original and other than the broken strap, in great condition. Some DNA that took about 20 minutes to clean up with rodico including a quick crystal touch up with polywatcn. It seems like it was worn for a bit and when the strap broke it was put in a drawer. Put a temp rubber strap on and for £8 can't really beat it. Runs OK on the timegraoher but probably can be adjusted...

My repair for the day, and wearing it. Sekonda. Slava movement 2427 automatic.