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Seems like ages since I last posted on 404, here is a ladies Seiko 2906A I picked up from Ramon in the Philippines as part of a job lot, so worked out to be $1.60. I did require a new crystal (£10.12) because the original shattered when I tried to remove it and it also needed a new winding stem (£2.00) and crown (from my spares) as it arrived without these, all of the screws for the automatic works were floating around inside the movement and the pawl lever for the auto works had one arm completely broken off so needed replaced (I had one from a donor) but apart from that it's all original. Here are the before and after pictures: Here is how it looked when I first opened the back...... and you get that "it gonna be one of those watches..." feeling And here is the finished watch:

I was thinking just as well this didn't start with a pain in the ass God knows what members would have come up with that includes me.

We are, we don't have a life? But who gives a f£^k? Hehe. Posted before, we're probably not normal. I'm no way sober. Happy New year to all.

Have you put breaking grease o n the barrel wall?

Well i didn't want to say anything, but now that you've mentioned it

Welcome to the club.

Yes, managed to save it, but was quite a bit of work.

I have to wonder how many balance staff pivots are broken when you have a jewel assembly designed to prevent that from happening? If you read carefully which I know you did So in other words proper diagnostics was not done before a course of action was taken. This is usually always the way we approach things well sort of. A lot of times I like to ask background history but occasionally people refuse to give history they somehow think that we should be able to just give an answer. But if you read typically certain things always occur in problem solving like for instance So you're right classically when there's a problem on one side of the balance and it's not the balance pivots it's the balance jewels. But on this group the current obsession is bent bridges which by the way is acceptable Swiss practice and the most common is shimmering shimmering fixes everything including bent hairsprings that might be causing an issue. So shimmering is the number one fixed for most problems on this message board or at least the number one suggested of what the problem could need Now the other problem with this discussion is the original posting person only posted one message I wonder if he's ever going to come back to us? So we will be stuck with unsolved mysteries forever probably

Apparently it's James Bond's choice of watch! Picked up this pair at an antique/estate sort of shop near me. The owner asked what I was looking for, and when I said wristwatches he pulled out several Ziploc bags full and let me dig through them. I picked up this pair for a nice price. One case is in pretty rough shape, the other looks fairly good. Both movements seem reasonably clean, and the balances swing easily when I wiggle the watches. Interesting that one is shock protected and the other isn't. I'll post more when I get around to working on them, but for now: A couple more inside the backs. Looks like service marks in one from 78 and 88.

...it's New Year's Eve and you're sitting reading and writing on WRT. ...you start your timing machine before you start the coffee maker. I guess there are many other ways to know, so please fill in with more signs that you are stuck in the repair quagmire

My mentor warned me not put my watch repair bench in the bedroom. He often gets ready for bed, then decides to fiddle a little more and before he knows it, it's 3am. I sometimes get up to go to the bathroom, then end up in my workshop assembling a movement.

...remembering the names of people, even those I easily recognise. It can be extremely embarrassing. ...remembering the name of a certain very hard watch crystal. Every time I try to explain to someone that there are three types of watch crystals, acrylic, mineral, and... and... and... sorry can't remember it now. It naturally exposes me as a liar after declaring myself deeply interested in horology.

Hehe. I don't understand dancing, absolutely no desire to do so. PS, my maths is pretty good good but give me a telephone number etc, I'll mix the numbers up. We were texting at the same time.

I am a numeric dislexic have problems remembering numbers but I can remember my Dads car plate from the 50s brothers army number and most of my car plates thro 70, 80, but mental maths is crap. I made a living as a Computer Engineer , and can repair most things. DIY skills are very good. Just the bloody numbers. Also crap at dancing and darts. Also forgot music and singing absolutely no musical talent at all.

Isn't it strange? You can make watch/ clock parts too within microns but you don't trust yourself to drill a hole. How weird we all all are.

Anything to do with D I Y. I do have an electric drill but I don't trust myself to use it. I think I would be dangerous using it drilling a hole in the wall to hang a picture. I prefer to pay someone.

I found a way that worked for me to get that clip back on. Rather than putting the clip on the friction pinion I placed the clip on a bench anvil and then pressed the friction pinion into the clip. I first tried putting pressure straight down but it didn't go in so I placed the pinion at an angle hoping that would help align it as it tried to seat. I noticed afterwards that the clip is upside down but after driving it home with my staking set it seems have decent friction on the pinion. We'll see how it works once I get it assembled.

Carrying any extra muscle mass you can into old age seriously has real benefits. Toned muscles support joints, absorb joint impacts that can otherwise cause trauma injuries that never get better. What is gained mentally from this kind of exercise or any exercise for that matter is huge compared to the effort involved of working out. I'm not just talking about sweating it out in the gym but if you can safely then that's great. If all that can be managed is sat in a chair and raising tins of beans in front of yourself and above your head that has exactly the same effect. Folk just need to find the right level of intensity that benefits them without overdoing it. The body is a series of motors doing different things in everyday life, sometimes individually, sometimes combining to work in synergy with each other to complete a set task. A 2 horse power mechcanical motor is always a 2 horse power motor that eventually mechanically breaks down through overload. A body's 2 horse power motor can become a 3 horse power motor with overload, and rebuild from good nutrition and rest. That newly built 3 horse power motor can then do 2 horsepower work, faster and with less effort. Resistance training overload 101.

For a moment it was like the cartoon where the chair had a shorter leg and I cut the longer ones and end up with another leg longer. But happy to report that the basket trued up nicely. I also noticed that the stirrer motor has a collet chuck. I could remove that and fit a fixed coupling to reduce some more wobble.

That is not too unusual, and I don't think that indicates a problem or that something is wrong, but I'm not perfectly sure about that. If it is a Swiss movement you should definitely be using braking grease on the inner barrel wall as indicated by @RichardHarris123

I think that most of us on here are probably a bit odd. I definitely am, I've been told enough times. Oh well.

I have been told I have an odd sense of humor. It must be the med's I take, no one in the family are anything like me.

I second that, if you cant laugh at life then eventually you're going to cry about it and that is just not a good place to be. Find fun in everything you do its the best medicine there is.

Hi Old Hippy I think we are all a pain in the ass some times. Good job you haven’t lost your sense of humor. A good laugh and a cheerful disposition helps a log. Since age 65, had a bucket load of problems latterly Covid but still get a laugh out of life. Happy New Year to everyone

I found the solution! TheTimekeeper has a YouTube video, " How to: open a steeldive puck case." The key was attaching a suction cup to the crystal and turning it clockwise to unscrew the bezel/crystal unit to remove the movement. Hope this helps if someone has a similar issue with this type of watch.

I have a couple of fountain pens, picked up over the years, but I was looking for something I could put in my pocket and not feel too upset about if I lost it. With this in mind I dropped into the huge rabbit hole that is the world of fountain pens. Who know that in this day and age, I wasn't the only person who still enjoyed using a fountain pen. Eventually I pulled the trigger on a couple of low cost Chinese pens. Both are Jinhoa branded. The Mont Blonc esque black one is a "Jinhao X450 Black with Fireworks" with a 0.5mm F nib, the other is a "Jinhao 599 Transparent Fountain Pen" 0.5mm Nib. I have no idea if they will be any good, but they were so inexpensive (both would qualify for a fountain pen 404 club membership), that I figured I had nothing to loose. If they are anywhere near as good as the reviews I found on youtube, they will be more than adequate.

I don't suppose we can get a picture of the movement the quartz movement?

Try using a sharpened brass wire to loosen the pegwood bits, then flush it with a syringe filled with water. Use a larger size needle, like a 18G or 12G. Flatten the sharp tip until you get a blunt needle. Try to get a seal around the jewel hole and forcefully flush the debris out.

In testing now. Not as good an outcome as I usually achieve, but good enough for now. Felsa 690 came in a Pesag branded dial/case—looks like a late 1950s/early 1960s vintage. Movement had several issues—broken mainspring, broken pallet fork pivot, fouled hairspring. Was able to source the mainspring and pallet fork on eBay. Spent 2 days working the hairspring back to a point that the watch runs with good amplitude, but still has significant positional timing issues in dial right position. Since this is a project watch that I intend to re-sell on eBay as-is, I’m going to call it a day. I could invest further in a balance complete but simply don’t think this piece is worth any further investment since it keeps time within 30-60 secs per day depending on position.

When assembling the parts, leave the spring for last and before insertinf ti, check wether the wheel and the finger that change the date move free. It is possible that tightening the screw to much has deformed the post in the plate and now the bearing is tight. if this is the case, the problem may be the post has bekome shorter OR thicker, so different ways for solution would be used

ok the balance complete [part code 310] [individual part code 470] are the same for movements 4005A [27J], 4006A [17J], 4006A [27J], 6215A [35J], 6245A [35J], 6245A [39J] and the balance cock [part code 171] [individual part code 805] are the same for 4005A [27J], 4006A [17J], 4006A [27J], I hope this helps with your search.....

Sigh, No joy with the various oils. So, I took the brute force method. The links holding the band to the spring bars were already distorted, so I opened them up more so I could get them off the spring bars. Once done, I cut through the bars with a pair of wire cutters and got them out. They were full of crud, so I doubt there would have been any other way of removing them. Back in the vibrating cleaner for a thorough wash to get all the crude out of the remaining pieces. I definitely need to buy some new fat spring bars and spring bar tool. This project has been had on tools. I killed the spring bar tool and a pair of wire cutters. Thanks for all the help. I'll post pictures once it's all back together. chris

You need to grease the lever under the date wheel, where the finger rides on it, also its pivot point and where its screw touches it. Heavy oil like HP1300 on the date wheel and finger. Grease where the spring touches the lever. The spring is a weak point; they are often broken (yours looks OK), but they have just enough oomph to kick the date over. So lubrication is important. Also the date jumper needs proper lubrication on its pivot points including the shouldered screw that holds the little plate on- and the plate, and where its spring rides, and a little smear of grease on the faces that touch the date ring. The quick set wheel is clutched so as long as it's free (and lubricated) it shouldn't be an issue. If you are in setting trying to advance the date with the dial off, the hour wheel tends to ride up releasing the built up energy in the lever, you might have to hold it in place gently with a piece of pegwood.

make sure the quick-set wheel is not engaged during date wheel movement....

Frustrations we all get to have bad days of frustrations. You get to have a frustrating day of what the heck is John trying to say. I get to be frustrated with the dictation software it sets me free and allows me to come and play with you but it's just frustrating. Sometimes it has a mind of its own sometimes a spot on. Sometimes for complicated things I spent like an entire afternoon being obsessed with trying to get something perfect and then I notice peculiar things and I've proofread it like 1 million times it's just frustrating maybe in the future if I do a you don't understand the paragraph just quit we can have a laugh at the stupidity of dictation software or I might have just said the words wrong. Yes there are times why cannot figure out for the life of me why it's done what it's done. It's supposed to have intelligence to grasp what the conversation is but still like for instance let's see if? The words C? It's going to make no sense at all to anybody what I just did but where I said let's see if we get the word C let me help you out here what's going on I'm saying the exact same word of see=C yes the probably take a little bit a deciphering of what I've just done I keep saying the same thing except dictation gives me the C sometimes and other times it actually will spell it out the way it's supposed to be and often times I just won't see it at all. Really weird how it does stuff so it's really troubling you don't grasp it just do a quote and we'll see if we can decipher it hopefully. Now back to the discussion which is actually a multiple discussion for instance if you purchase something from cousins is the contract really with cousins? We end up with some really amusingly peculiar problems here typically with most stuff they sell it in a package it sealed up they just receive and send it off to you things are fine or not fine. But what about equipment that has warranties from other companies may be expensive equipment that what happens who honors the warranty or what if the warranty gets Well refuse to be honored because of the claim was damaged in shipping due to incompetence With packaging for instance then the problem becomes whose packaging yes the company was incompetent with their packaging but broken in shipping to wherever it was purchased from broken when being shipped to you who is your warranty with? I should go "up above but I'll continue in my example in the state of Washington sales tax is collected on the final product. So one of my material houses will only sell wholesale for watch parts. She can sell you tools and supplies because the watchmaker is the final user of the product. Some of this I think is an excuse to protect the trade because I know she can collect sales tax because usually I have or collect the sales tax for me even though I do have a business license because typically I'm the final user of watch parts. Or one of my friends ordered something from her and she shipped it to the state of Oregon which does not have sales tax they do income tax and that was okay because she didn't have to collect tax. On the other hand you have your value added tax and sooner or later the tax people want their tax money and if cousins isn't collecting the tax money from you guess who gets stuck with it and probably a penalty. So our discussion appears to be going in a multiple of directions like are the various material houses protecting the wholesale trade of their watchmakers? Or is it purely a tax reason? The warranty issue though does bring up an interesting problem of who honors the warranty. I guess what is suggesting is if you're going to purchase an expensive item from cousins you better inquire as to who is going to handle warranty issues. Especially with anything that's breakable often times the shipping people get stuck with this but if the item was shipped to cousins and already damaged then getting a warranty claim on a broken item may be nonexistent. This is where maybe purchasing at least in the UK from one of the other physical material houses where he could physically go with open up your whatever verify that it does work versus cousins Who doesn't seem to physically exist at all. Yes I do know they physically exist a tractor address down once but you look online they claim they don't physically exist they exist in the cloud only.

Starting weight lifting at the relatively late age of my mid 40s strengthened all the weak areas of my body including my back. I would recommend some form of resistance training to anyone.

The most skilled and successful people I have had the privilege to meet in my life were all also the most humble, curious, and inquisitive, and I think, no, I'm sure there's a strong connection between humble, curious, inquisitive, and success. I shall never forget my meeting with Mstislav Rostropovich in the early 1980s. I was a violin student and he was coming for a visit to our music school. We, the students, and the music world thought of him as a god. In my mind, I was picturing us, the students, bowing before him and thanking him for visiting our school, but when he arrived he shook hands with each student, introduced himself, and thanked us for the invitation. I will never forget it. And as I remember it he had more questions for us than we of him. It blew my mind.

Ha I think I got the same handout when Simonin taught us back around '98! Of course it's long lost, great to get it again.

So far, since 2015, CousinsUK has given me an excellent services, including returned items of low value when Royal Mail cocked up. In all those years that I've been ordering, not a single item was faulty. CousinsUK also gives the IOSS service (Import One Stop Shop) for Europe, which I can't find by HS Walsh or by Gleave & Co (?). Anyhow, thanks for the alternative addresses, but for these to have any value to me, they have to have IOSS

Hi Dan welcome to the forum.

Thank you for your introduction and welcome to this friendly forum. We all look forward to your contributions and continued involvement.

Hello and welcome to the forum Dan, you are now entering beyond the point of no return. Try to sign up on the watch fix course for a thorough training session.

Hello and welcome from Leeds, England.

I have been out of the loop here, during America's Medicare-Annual-Election-Period. I cannot believe we have lost Roland Ranfft. I'd heard of him and his database before I'd even encountered this forrum. I am very sad to learn of his passing now. I wish I'd found time to check back in here earlier. I wish I'd been able to thank him for all his contributions to our craft.

You sure like to make life hard. Why don't you buy them already sharpened.

Try this https://oakandoscar.com/blogs/the-dial/from-the-bench-regulation-part-1#:~:text=That little gold fork (called,making the watch run faster.

What movement is this? It might be cheaper to buy a few scrap movements and obtain the jewels from these movements. New jewels are very expensive, and may not correspond to the exact pivot size and OD of the original, which means you will have to ream the holes in the mainplate and bridges.

I just finished a similar project, and wanted to put an update here on the crystal, to help future searchers. The Sternkreuz FBA 321.701 is also a good replacement for this watch. The GS CY 934-17 is not. I was able to source the Sternkreuz through Cousins. Here's a photo of the completed watch. Happy jumping! Dave

Fingers crossed, hoping it's this style of case. The notch for a case knife may be anywhere along the bezel, in this case (Seiko Chariot) it's opposite the crown.