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Hello folks, I didn't get time over the weekend but I did manage to reset the hands yesterday and the date change is now working correctly. However, I did scuff the dial a bit Lesson learnt - get it right the first time! Thanks again.

Well, if it were the only purpose of a watch. For those of us who love mechanical watches, it is more like an art. I carry my android phone so I know the time within a nanosecond I suppose, but I still look at my watch and admire the beauty of what is inside.

I guess you need to see the finished product.

I had good luck with Rotary watches on eBay. They tend to have AS or ETA movements and I've picked up a couple with ETA 2824 for which the parts are readily available. There was a bit of discussion on this the other day and the consensus was that if the pics don't show the movement then don't buy. The other option is to buy a new movement from Cousins. There are a number of Chinese movements available for around £40 inc VAT that are ETA clones. Yes, the quality might not be the same, but the movement is new and working (otherwise return it), which is more than can be said for a lot of eBay junk.

UPDATE: I found a pair of 2.8mm pusher extensions that fit the case ring and now the chronograph is working as it should.

Hi all, I took delivery of some new screwdrivers a few weeks ago, and although these are a Chinese brand (Kwong Yuen) I would highly rate them, may even prefer them to my Burgeon set. Nothing in this for me, just hope that someone who is looking can take advantage of this experience. Link here. As a side note I also have some auto oilers of the same brand and they also work well.

That hairspring looks brilliant - how can I find a fault? With a good strong rotation it is rubbing together at the exit of the collet at the bend or…rubbing the collet pin where it sticks out a bit. I have no confidence in either- it looks great… ..sorry mate, good luck with this one. Keep us posted… I did look this up…here on this site- thanks gents… Rone watches were listed (by Pritchard) as Rone Watch Co. SA, Bole (circumflex on 'o'), Switzerland, and the same source mentions that they were listed again from 1966-1973. Rone watches were seemingly in production from the 1940s (1920s more likely based on case hallmarking) until the middle of the 1970s. A variety of models are found branded, Rone, including some in solid gold, which can have the maker's mark "RWC" or "RWCo" for Rone Watch Company. In connection with the designation, RWC, there has been some confusion with Rolex, but Rone watches are not related to Rolex in any way. They used FHF movements and labeled them. There are Rone cal 1045s out in the wild right now…

As I mentioned in another post, we're starting to see quite a few 'Mumbai specials' being sold by UK sellers. It appears that people have bought them from India, opened them up and though 'sod that' and put them up for sale. Lot's of Oris, Fortis, Favre-Leuba and Seiko that are real bodge jobs. In fact, I'm crossing my fingers that one arriving tomorrow doesn't fall into the above category but there are lots of new spares available at a reasonable price.

Hi, If you're starting out and looking for movements to practice on, job lots of uncased moments isn't bad way to go. I found having a bone pile to work through of "no consequence" movements, freed me up to get stuck in and make my mistakes. When it comes to looking for keepers on eBay; If a seller sells lots of watches, and has one up without a picture of the movement, run away, it's probably not even the right movement for the watch. But if they're not a watch selling specialist and the price is right could be worth a punt, but factor in a 50% failure rate Use Ranfft and http://www.julesborel.com to search out other incarnations of movements your interested in. I've found eBay stores of medium sized charities (regional not national) a good place to search for watches. They'll often not put to much effort into the description with means fewer bidders, the watches are often donations that haven't been filtered through dealers and watchmakers, and therefore on there 12th repair attempt and they're not out to scam you. All the best

Hopefully people will chip in, but the Seagull TY3600 is a clone of the Swiss 6497 movement, which is a pocket watch movement. It's larger that a wristwatch movement so easier to work on and is well priced at £37.50 plus VAT. Here's the link to the Cousins site and it's the 3rd from bottom. https://www.cousinsuk.com/product/3-hands-seagull

Pictures don't show everything, as I've found out to my cost, but just being able to identify the movement is a good start. Certain movements are easier to get parts for. I've bought some real dogs on eBay, with glued on dials, drenched in oil, hairsprings like spaghetti and the rest. That's why a lot of people suggest getting a new movement to practice on. At least you're starting with a working movement, new mainspring etc. You can get lucky on eBay - I picked up a Zodiac 72b described as having a broken balance the other week. The balance is mint as is everything else on the movement, it was just overbanked. However this is the exception on eBay.

No idea what the 1045 is. Took the hairspring off to check it sits correctly on the balance cock - the collet is pretty central. The coils are nicely spaced and the terminal curve is OK. Gave it another clean in acetone and IPA. Same problem. I'll put the entry pallet jewel back where it first was to give more lock. Slap some more (i.e. too much) 9415 around the escape wheel, and if necessary, some oil on the pallet pivots to slow it all down.

I think you mis spelt **BLEEP** wit

Is there a physical chemistry major among us to explain this process. I know a little, thought I share. Its called ( thixotropic property ) of fluid and is temperature dependant. Intermolecular bonds take hold and gelatinize the fluid which if ( the bond) is sheared by force, intermolecular forces quickly reorganize to form a bond again, which is a quick process in 9415. Thst is; molecules reorganize before the fluid gets a chance to travel/ spread. You pay $180 for the work done by intermolecular forces. Moebius gets rich.

Also a thread here - https://mb.nawcc.org/threads/rip-dr-roland-ranfft-26-6-1950-19-03-2023.200499/ Someone has made a web page of the database available here - https://xchwarze.github.io/ranfft-db/app/ The search works well. Edit: Yikes. Just noticed this is the same as the link @LittleWatchShop posted.

Looks to me that the battery has a contact pad welded to it. Most rechargeable batteries seem to have this format. It looks as if the battery is tucked under the mainplate at the bottom of your pic and can maybe be released by easing the top out (nearer the coil) and sliding it out upwards. The battery is probably a re-chargeable cell that come with the contact pad as a unit.

The best quality observed today by far… Wait- what day is it? Sunday the 1st? In fact the best quality this week- nay- dare I say- the best this MONTH!!!

I had the SAME thought!!

There is plenty of space between to outer coil and the regulator pins. I did change the mainspring, GR5255 - the correct one GR5254 is discontinued - same dimensions but 20mm longer. I'll take some more vids.

if you go in the YouTube settings you can change the speed of play back to 0.25 and other words really slow it's not touching. It would be nice if you could do a new video aimed in a different direction though. Because I can't get a really good picture of the hairspring and any of the other pictures and I want to see what it looks like moving. what I can't see in the image here is it's a little too dark and it be nice to see it moving it's hard to tell the shape of the terminal curve and how close the rest of the hairspring is to hitting the backside of the regulating pins. also did you change the mainspring in this watch? as you have nothing to lose what about a experiment let's go for more 9415 maybe put a little in each of the pallet stones way more than whatever you have. then we are timing the watches it fully wound up? What if you let it run for a few hours is that change anything also put the watch crown wn and let us see what that looks like.

Many thanks for your inputs. The crown and pendant are clean. However, while taking out the movement from the case, I noticed that the movement clamps although tight on he movement had a very slight gap where they sit on the case seat. The case is a top entry case i.e. the movement goes in from the top and are held by case clamps on the rotor side. Not sure why there is a slight gap, perhaps the clamps have bent slightly with age. I am wondering if there is an offset between the stem hole on the movement and the stem hole on the case and if this could cause the tightness as with the movement out of the case, there are no winding issues. This time when I mount the movement back, I will check of any offset between the stem hole on the case and the movement. Waiting for some pointers to check.

Chinese Bergeon

From my research, the 9415 undergoes a physical chemistry reversible reaction caused by shock or impact, reducing its viscocity momentarily. This is probably why it's recommended for high beat movements and has the potential to remain a bit too gloopy in slower beaters because of the reduced impact. Clever folks at Moebius (or was I sucked in by the sales hype?!?). I was so chuffed with the results here, I had a cordovan strap made by "The Strap Tailor" to fit my 8.5" wrist. It's a beaut. I'll stick some pics on once I've been to the tanning salon and had my left arm waxed.

Here you go, have his and a slice of Persian love cake (that's what it's called people) also some rose tea. Enjoy!j (Just in case, here's a nice cognac

Almost a year on and this turns up in a local antique shop, in the UK Check out the numbers

reason why there's a variety of numbers is it depends upon who made the watch and the watch itself. If you have software or a timing machine they can do a time plot another way to look at timing results and you wind your watch up nice and tight you will initially see a much higher amplitude then which you really want to have. It's one of the reasons you can take set mainsprings and get them to work by widening them up nice and tight especially if they're really really set they will initially have power but they will lose it really really fast. So basically the watch companies have a time span it's not an exact number is just do not time when you wind it up tight let it run for little bit the settled down and lose that excessive energy. Otherwise you may get weird timing results because you have too much power then watch companies are not usually obsessed with amplitude like this group is there more obsessed with timekeeping. But typically it does depend on the watch companies Omega will take down to I think 160° at the end of 24 hours it depends upon the particular watch. So the watch companies at 24 hours like to see a certain minimum but what they really want to see is timekeeping does the watch keep time at the end of 24 hours. Then if they get really picky though give you and isochronal error. In other words your watch at full he wound up versus 24 hours later how close is that timekeeping. okay I believe you said you using an app and I'm guessing you just drop the watch on the phone and your often timing? Can you give us a picture of the watch on your timing device or if you can't do that can you at least tell us what apps are using so we can go and look up what it looks like what exactly are you seeing of that we can't see because we really do need to understand what it is you're using and what it looks like when it's running otherwise especially with apps were usually wasting our time at least based on past experience.

I can’t remember where I saw it VWatchie but I have seen a graph of mainspring delivered torque where you see very high torque for the first hour reducing rapidly till the one hour mark. Around the one hour mark the curve flattens out and remains pretty flat until sometime after 24 hours. It will then drop off fairly precipitously when it is getting close to the power reserve limit. Maybe one of the cleverer than me folks on here can confirm or maybe even have a copy of a similar graph. Tom

Good reminder. I need to hang a sign above my bench saying "Yo, doofus, slow down and pay attention!"

interesting? interesting as I haven't noticed that and I typically work on pocket watches that are low-frequency 18,000 and all he uses 9415. Then if you get really obsessed with it if you use too much of the grease you are supposed to lose amplitude but in my mind it depends upon the particular escapement. So basically where the escape wheel has impact it becomes super slippery that's good but if the sides of escape wheel and the pallet stone art to think the sides will be sticky and will hold things in place. This is why if you look at Omega's recommendation is super minimalistic because are concerned about that. Then as a reminder in this discussion you're dealing with a watch it is running at 36,000 BPH which is twice as fast as the normal watch and I've seen in other discussion groups where there always was a concern about lubricating the escapement because you're running twice as fast. so perhaps it's just telling us that if you're going to use 941 which is not recommended for higher frequency escapement's different time to time you should put some fresh oil in there just to keep it lubricated because you wouldn't want your escapement to wear out.

when you're assembling the watch and you put the gear train in before you put the pallet fork in and the balance wheel you would attempt to wind the watch which I realize in your particular case is a bit weird but still you attempt to wind the watch and make sure that the gear train spins. One of the test for whether the train is free but it depends upon the particular watches is to look for something callbacks spin. This is where you wind the watch until the train spins you stop then the train will spend down losing energy but it I should go past the stopping point and slightly backward wind the mainspring and in the train will stop next to go backwards just say. But it depends upon the particular watch that's usually considered a very free gear train. But no matter what you want to wind the watch and make sure that the gear train is free spinning. Then you put in the pallet fork only no balance wheel yet and verify that that is functional app the same time your lubricating that in other words are lubricating the escapement. Then when that works you can put in the balance wheel.

I replaced a PW manual wind MS the other day. It did not use a "bridle" in the automatic wind sense, but had the reverse catch welded to the end. I was winding in my trusty K&D winder and got close to inserting it into the winder at that last stage and it just popped off. I think it was a bad weld, frankly. Easy fix. Annealed the end and bent it back.

So true, I had a friend who used to say "sometimes it has to hurt to learn" I have found this to be true on so many occasions, just part of the human condition I suppose.

Well I would definitely start with Moebius 9010 (for train wheels and balance endstones) and 9020 (for train wheels) if you are working on Pocket Watches. Moebius 9415 is a must for Pallet/Escape wheel teeth. A quality silicon grease. Moebius D5 is essential (barrel arbor, motion work). Molycote DX or Moebius 9501 grease for keyless work. Moebius 9501 or 9504 for high friction (e.g. Cannon pinion, Setting lever spring and anything at high friction). Moebius 8200 grease for mainspring. Moebius 8217 for barrel wall (automatic watches) It's a lot but at a minimum get 9010, 9415, D5 and 8200 I hope this helps. Recommended Lubricants for Getting Started.pdf Moebius_Oil_Chart.pdf