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I just finished repairing a Hamilton #940 21j open face 18size P/W. made in 1909 I have been working on it as I get the parts needed. I cleaned it , replaced the mainspring, balance staff, pallet jewels, top balance stone , and crystal . I had a bit of trouble with the timing , but finally got it to 20 seconds a day, which I can live with. While doing that I finished a painting for an up coming show called "Kathleen Louise Passing Bald Head " So I'm happy today

One other part I made on the "new" lathe is a proper strong and deep enough die to deal with tall crystals such as on the 1680 and VERY tall one of the 1655 (Sea-Dweller). Most foul on the crystal. My old solution was a 30mm 12-point socket. it works, but it does not press the retainer flat and square relative to the case top surface, so I have to go back and "peck" it down with another tool all around the crystal... Here it is: (The blue Tudor will be it's first victim)

Hey guys. Been occupied by other things lathely, namely getting an old lathe up and running here at work... It's quite beat and abused but Its a high quality Hardinge lathe. I rebuilt the compound (which clips onto the dovetail way as it's a lower-end second-operation lathe) so it has limited travel. The angle scale (which is under the top of the compound and visible through a magnifying glass built in) was completely covered in rust and grease. Now it's visible... It came in handy to set ~2 degrees of taper for my tack! I also took the excessive lash out of the compound ways so they are nice and tight now. This is a sweet lathe with a 3-jaw chuck as well as an assortment of 5C collets. I learned from a master tool and die maker on the high end version of this- the tool room lathe, with a proper apron able to cut inch and metric threads. This is it's lesser cousin. A brass rod was tapered as thin as I could and then finished with sand paper as it was deflecting from the tool of course and not cutting as it got thin... I pressed it into a 1" slug of aluminum. A bit of tubing to keep it safe and a recycled container and we are done! Anyway, here's the tack:

Try Omega chrono sub hands. Like the 821 caliber (or 321 but those get silly expensive) I used an Omega running seconds sub dial hand (the left one) on an a Valjoux 7734 that worked perfectly. The minute counter (right sub dial) needs to be broached slightly. Check at www.ofrei.com as I believe they list the diameters of the pinions of the hands in most cases.

Glad you got it all sorted out! When first reading, I was going to suggest wrapping dental floss around the canon and then trying. Looks like you found a good one! Just clean and polish so it gleams like new for next time!

Very attractive watch. I like shiny pretty things. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk