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Hey everyone! I am very glad to see this forum, after some time just checking the content around I decided to make my first post and introduce myself. So my name is Jakub and I do my part of keeping watchmaking cool from Estonia. Honestly, it feels I must be part of very shy society, since in 2 years of keeping this hobby I found nobody to share my trouble or joy. All started when I bought many puzzles to solve and find them not challenging at all. So I gave it a thought and all for sudden it was clearer then never. “What about buy watchmaking kit from Amazon and couple Soviet watches from flea market and give a watchmaking a try?” And guess what, now 2 years later I find this as my best decision of life. Basically the same day I received my cheap kit I ordered more, better tools and continued through sonic bath, staking set, timegraher and so on. Meanwhile my focus shifted on Swiss made watch, chronographs, chronometers and triple calendars. It starts to be hard on my wallet to keep this going, so I’m thinking to change my trade from finance to watchmaking and do it for living. In my consideration is BHI distant course, since that is so far best I can get on distance with certificate and in English. I am looking forward sharing my experience (I mean lack of experience;)) with you and hope to improve my skills with seeing previous solutions to be found. Ps.: I want to attach picture of my latest job lot. This are watches I recently worked on or I will in close time. But I’m already starting being too long ? Thank you for your attention Jakub

Knowing your lift angle is not a life or death situation for using the timing machine. If you don't like the numbers on the machine either because are too high or too low versus what you think you're seeing in the watch just change the lift angle to give your machine happier numbers. I know it doesn't sound like a very scientific method but it really doesn't matter that much. Because even if it's not exactly right you could still look at dial-up dial down and the crown positions and see how much it varies.. Then as this is a new timing machine additional information like PDFs. Probably not the same company who produced your machine but still good information. Also a link that lists lift angles just not American pocket watch lift angles. Then your question has interesting timing for me in that two things related to this question of come up this week.. First on Monday my boss asked the same question.. So I got to explain what American pocket watches came into existence timing machines did not exist at all. It's not until vacuum tubes become readily available do machines that can show rate come into existence.. Then amplitude measuring machines don't really come into existence at least in any quantity until we get to the digital machines.. Then the Swiss get obsessed with amplitudes and we have always nifty charts but they don't care about pocket watches. It's really only when the hobbyists get their cheap Chinese machine does it become a bigger problem.. The other reason why the question is interesting is at work we found a better way of observing the 180° for finding the lift angle. There is a link to a YouTube video no notice that the dot he has is easy to see.. We found that using a Yellow FORAY® Liquid Ink Highlighter With a UV flashlight works really really well. To understand that I have pictures attached.. Nice bonus that while it's a highlighting pen on metal standard lighting it's basically invisible.. That comes off in the cleaning machine it's not a problem.. The second reason the timing is interesting for your question is that the UV flashlight at work went missing and I ordered one off of eBay yesterday. There really cheap one eBay it's probably way brighter than what I had before and I'll let you know how it works when it comes. The reason we had a UV light it was given to us by some watch company it makes the dials look much prettier or anything on the dial that would florescent really fluoresces under UV.. But I'm guessing somebody in the front room thought the flashlight was broken and didn't grasp what it was and tossed it in the trash. Then I suppose something good with an obsessed boss lift angles below came from that. The only thing where I made a mistake I should I had the serial numbers that we would know exactly which model watch these are because you'll notice that it's not set like all 16 size or 18 size are not the same it varies. Ball Illinois 12 size 45° Elgin 12 size 55° Elgin 18 size 49° Elgin 590 16 size 21 J 48° Elgin GM Wheeler 16 size 52° Elgin 6 size 62° Hamilton 12 size 48° Hamilton 912 12 size 38° Hamilton 940 16 size 60° Hamilton 992 16 size 48° Hamilton 992B 51.5° Hamilton 992E 42°Louis Audemar 44° Hampton 3/0 52° Illinois 12 size 45° Illinois 305 16 size 48° Illinois 6 size 62° Lange and Sohne 40° Longines pocket watch 35° Waltham 18 size 38.5° Waltham 1888 16 size 60° Waltham 21 jewel 645 16 size 42° Waltham Crescent Street 45° Waltham Riverside 16 size 44° https://watchguy.co.uk/cgi-bin/lift_angles https://youtu.be/-Xgcck692js witschi Witschi Training Course.pdf witschi X-D-DVH-Di-Im-N_EN.pdf

Surely best is to determine the lift angle according above methods. But PWs have lower angles than WWs. If you use 40 degrees, you are in the ballpark. Frank

The lift angle on vintage pocket watches is a function of the position of the banking pins, which are usually adjustable. Usually, the first thing an amateur watchmaker does is adjust them thinking it will solve whatever problem exists. That just makes it worse. If the escapement is in proper alignment it should be in beat. If it is not in beat when it is properly aligned, it indicates some bozo has been there ahead of you. On a watch with adjustable banking pins, I start with a 52 degree lift angle and check the amplitude and beat error. If they are good, I move on. If not, the problem can be complex based on what the last person did to it. The solutions are many and more involved than I can discuss here. The slow motion idea is a good one if you really need to know the lift angle for some particular reason.

I may be wrong here but I don't think this is a quartz watch. I think the battery is probably a clue that it's an electric watch. Do you have any electrical test equipment as this is A electric watch it be nice to have a power supply and some way to measure current and even resistance? Then we really need a service manual for this one. Some balance wheel electric watches had a hack or a method of stopping the balance wheel. Then when you push the crown in a given to push so it take off and run and that's what you may be seeing right now when you're playing with the stem of the crown. Because otherwise to get a clue we need some electronic test.

Just because I'm curious can we have a picture of the other side of the wheel? On some American pocket watches the center wheel pinion can unscrew.. This is because when the mainspring breaks it can release a lot of bad energy back into the watch and that was their safety feature. Otherwise normally the two parts should be really tightly riveted together..

Just a thought. Are you sure the battery has 100% full voltage. It looks a bit domed (it should be flat) which is an indication that it is at the end of life and may not be giving enough voltage output. Did you check voltage with a meter, it should be as near as possible to 1.5v, most new cells are about 1.56v. Below 1.4v and it needs changing. Even 'new' batteries may have degraded in storage, so ensure it is a fresh new battery not one from old stock.

Your abilities or confidance is not questioned here, rather watchrepair as I hear wouldn't put much food on the table, unless one is among the top ranked. And this renders what experience you have acquired in finance so far. Success demands singleness of purpose. Vince lombardi Well generally does anyway. Best wishes joe

One day I got loose on Russian web and got these! I know what Soviet watch is. But honestly, I enjoy them a lot with their big imperfections + they make me feel like real comrade ?

Thank you for your introduction and welcome to this friendly forum.

Its electric, Mark says he knows nothing of quartz watches. I know nothing of either one, but I can repair em. Mark; How freely does the balance wheel oscilate as you shake the watch, nudge the balance wheel to turn it, if at some point it kicks and shows any sign of life, its likely to be out of beat so bring the beat adjustor arm=( stud carrier arm) to the position that makes it kick. The sucker should kick and run.? Regs Joe

Looking at the photo of the balance again I would say the beat arm needs to move clockwise by 15 to 20 degrees comparing it to other Lip r 148's on the web. Or pushing the rate arm anticlockwise to get it in the middle before the bend in the hair spring. This may help.

Welcome to the forum Jakub enjoy.

Welcome here and good luck if you intend to change profession. Maybe you can do both.

http://forumamontres.forumactif.com/t4350-revue-technique-l ip-r148ther service information for you. Thinking about it when the stem is pulled the balance is moved to initiate the start therefore as the balance moves ok the hacking lever is doing its job, I think the fault ties else where.

http://www.crazywatches.pl/lip-r148-belforte-spaceview-electric-1962 this site has the service manual so may well be worth a look for further information

That is not a tourbillon (which cost in the thousands), it's just the balance visible from the top, sometime called "open hearth". Normally Chinese movements are not repairable but you should be able to buy a new movement for about EUR 15, and a complete watch for maybe 5 more.

True but you can always re oil the pivots after. I'm not recommending this method as I would rather do a proper service.

Thank you for your introduction and welcome to this friendly forum.

Doesn't that affect the lubrication?

Electric watches are fickle and often need a good shake to get them going. If a good shake gets it running and it then stops again it's time for a service. A bodge alternative to a service is to spray a degreaser on all the pivots and contacts........and you might get lucky.

A culprit on bellmatic is that bell set stem falls off and sometimes go unnoticed as it falls. I must have about fifteen bellmatic in my collection and about 10 to restore, Sorry I am not a jobber and work on my own watches only to make sure no corner is cut. Shipping abroad specially in covid days is unfavourable, but if it came down to shipping abroad, I can introduce you to this now a friend of mine here with life time experience working on seiko, I'll be the interpreter as he doesn't understand English. The repair cost here would be about 25 to 35 percent of rates in Europe and he dose have good (NOS) of parts plus used parts and gurantees his work for a year. I think your post and my reply to it, might not be unquestionable so far as forum policies. Regs Joe

Isn't this electric? I have a lip with similar looking movement. Check electrical contact.

Almost as good as Timex

Photo please.

welcome to the habit and have fun.

now I need instructions how to vid slow motion on my phone to view my balance wheel and instructions on my timegrapher to set lift angle...welp

sorry. couldn't help myself....?

Do not OIL, just oil

Something I've used before is the slow motion camera feature on many smart phones. Do the thing with putting a small amount of wind in and film the balance in slow motion. Add a turn of the crown if needed. It's a bit tedious but will work.

My research indicated you're supposed to have a split stem with this number 081ST9992 That's the Omega number. Then a lot of Omega watches have dials the press on that doesn't mean you're supposed to remove your watch by disassembling them from the front side. Helpful though if you're having a problem but that's not the purpose. Then I found someone else having a discussion about a watch like yours. https://omegaforums.net/threads/split-stem-for-cal-1481.18126/

A Ronda 1217-21 based Ingersoll joins me by the fire today. Its raining and "blowing up a hoolie" outside and we had a brief power cut earlier on. A perfect excuse to sit by the fire with a cup of tea and a few biscuits.

Hello and welcome to the forum

Welcome to the forum.

Nice find & interesting. I'm a fan of Telechron & GE/Telechron clocks. I like the Red Dot indicator on these (Earlier models). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telechron

I am slightly confused? Strangely enough I had seen your introduction which didn't have any replies which is why at least at the time it didn't? Which is why I assumed your posting your question here which yes is the appropriate place to ask watch repair questions. This is because people like me who look at the watch repair section won't notice repair questions other places. Then other common things people do which causes them not to typically get answers is to post in either a completed question or in the middle of an existing question posting something they perceived to be similar. Personally I think each watch is unique and it deserves its own unique discussion. Then my confusion is I see you got an answer in the introduction section found at this link here for those that are curious what the answer was https://www.watchrepairtalk.com/topic/17574-new-user-hello-from-australia-on-the-topic-of-seiko-bellmatics/?tab=comments#comment-151336 Also for future reference if you would like your pictures to be seen attached them as a JPEG. There is a website found at the link below that will do the conversion for you then you can upload the JPEG's which I've done for you this time just because I was curious. But typically people won't do that you have to do a little work to get answers for your questions. Normally with family pieces they have sentimental value or are valuable to the family especially if somebody points this out like you have. Then you would like it fixed as cheap as possible this is always a interesting term because cheap doesn't always translate into good. Just as unfortunately expensive does not always translate into good either unfortunately? Normally if you going to do some of the work yourself you're going to have to find a watchmaker to work with. Because typically watchmakers don't like to do a partial repair. In other words if the watchmaker repairs the movement and UK set up and it doesn't function correctly watchmaker may not honor any sort of warranty because they did not do the complete job. So this is where if you can find somebody locally to work with they might do it perhaps Then as far as polishing the case goes? One of the big trends when you're doing restoration work is to refinish the case the way it once looked which is considerably different then polishing a case to make it look shiny. This is where if you can find a catalog photograph of the original look at the watch you could see what it looks like. Then polishing crystals it depends on what the crystals made of. Plastic crystals you can polish but if that's a glass crystal it's best to replace it. Now what we need access to and conveniently I don't have one in my hand I think there's still buried in the attic someplace there might be one available for download a free look which is the Seiko casing book. So if you have the casing book you can look up your case number and things like the crystal the crowns should all be in their. On the other hand you could Google the case number and find something like this link https://www.watchmaterial.com/seiko-bellmatic-watch-crystal-with-tension-ring-silver/ So we would good news here your crystal looks like it's plastic which means you could polish it but personally I just replace it it would look better. Then it looks like all the rest the case numbers in the way they word yet that probably all of their alarm watches of this type use the same case parts perhaps different colors because they also one of these with a gold ring. But if they're all using the same case parts of make it a lot easier to find.

There's a very reputable Seiko specialist in Australia. Look for Vintage Time Australia (VTA)

I have a pocketwatch like that too. It was due to a worn pivot hole. Haven't gotten down to rebushing or converting it into a jewelled hole. Good luck.

Such tension can be easily explained if you didn't put some oil before replacing the cannon pinion. "pinching it a bit tighter" makes things worse.

Perhaps stops when the power is low? also try winding it every 4 hours to about 80%. A bent tooth could be the issues as the mainspring turns around 7 times in a full wind and the tooth could go through when there is plenty of power and not when the power is at say 50%. Intermittent failures are the hardest.

The lume binder holds the new pip in place.

Hi there,Well here's the finished result of the bezel after baking.I found the video of this painting and baking of bezels it's on YouTube in a channel called Red Dead Restoration and the video is Abandoned Breitling watch.The person uses Porcelaine Paint Pencils which I have just received and they have a very thin needle/tube where the paint comes out much better than the liquid paint and less messy.Photo of the finished bezel enclosed.