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Showing content with the highest reputation on 03/19/24 in all areas

  1. There is a tool for this, if you can find one. It's called an Obama Jewel Hole Gauge. It consists of a finely tapered pin which you push into the hole as far as it will go. The pin then pushes back into the body of the instrument until the jewel is against the tip. The hole diameter can then be read off the scale in 0.01mm increments down to 0.05mm. If you could find a suitably fine tapered pin there's no reason why you couldn't improvise by marking where the jewel sits on the taper and then measuring it with a micrometer. In practice though if you are replacing a jewel you could always just measure the pivot that is going to run in it.
    4 points
  2. This seems to be complicated case... We have many variables here and we need to exclude some of them to make some progress. We have plots that show amplitude variations, but we don't know if this variations are significant, as they can be 'amplified' or 'smoothed' by the software. So, some observation of the amplitude by eye will be of help. Then, if we really have not isochronical work, then the main reason for this would be the hairspring being not 'linear'. And not linear may be sometimes not only because 'touching', but because bad hairsping material structure. Some of the advanced watchmakers claim that repairing badly bent hairspring is useless, because this springs will never be isochronic again. Well, my own observations are that such thing happens, but not in all the cases and it depends on the case if the result is acceptable or not. I will not suppose here that this spring has been repaired, but it has some strange behavior watching at it's work. It will be good if it is possible to test the movement with another balance or thest the balance on another movement...
    3 points
  3. Thanks guys. It's a Seawolf 10ATM pre spring bezel. The case knife stressed me a bit, but eventually got it off and cleaned - nearly seventy years of grime. Thanks. Cheers John
    3 points
  4. Exactly. This is a pic of the hairspring I'm working on. My horizontal v vertical rates are all over the place. There is no discernible terminal curve. My problem is that the outer coil is (possibly) hitting the regulator pin. It's hard to tell but it looks to be getting very close. Also getting close to the stud, which could be @VWatchie's problem. You can see that I need to adjust the inner coil to centre the collet. That will hopefully solve the problem. But then I'll take the spring off and attach it to the cock to see how it looks. I don't know if it's causing your problem @VWatchie, but I would say your inner coil looks like this
    3 points
  5. I'm presently using a cheap supermarket ultrasonic cleaner, with L&R #111 cleaner and #3 rinse solutions. I cut a bit off the bottom of an appropriate size plastic sports drink bottle, which is a perfect fit around the mesh basket I use (~65mm diameter). That allows me to use mostly water in the machine tub and cleaner or rinse only in the small plastic container. I keep the solutions that are still fit for use in small glass jam jars. I use the cleaner then two rinses, then the mesh basket balances on my bathroom radiator (once it stops dripping) to dry the parts with moderate warmth. Prior to that I tried just lighter fluid (eg. generic zippo fluid) and just soaking / swirling parts in the glass jars, but the movements did not run at all well afterwards, they were still acting gummed up. The proper solutions make a world of difference & the watches now work as they should!
    2 points
  6. Have to agree with you. Will not do another. Did not enjoy the time spent. However, it was worth it to know that I understood how to disassemble, look for defects, repair and then assemble. Timegrapher? No facility to alter anything other than the stud. Everything is metal to metal.
    2 points
  7. Here are a couple of pictures of the tool that I mentioned in my first reply: Got the picture from here: https://klocksnack.se/threads/hobby-hörna-hemma-verktyg-tips-och-trix.163821/#post-4291582
    2 points
  8. Yep seen this tool before but never for sale. I bet there aren't many that aren't broken.
    2 points
  9. OK, several things to say here. The thought thay if with the old spring the movement works 16 hours, then replacing the spring will solve that - is totally wrong. With a new spring the movement probably will work for 17 hours. The power reserve is practically not reduced when the spring gets weak with the age. It is rather something wrong with the movement. As You worked on the hairspring, we need to confirm that it is OK now before everything else. So, thake the lever out and do the free oscillations test. What is the result? I expect numbers, not only 'it is good' or 'it is not good'. Then, this is no jewels pin lever movement, so this is not unusual to have not well regulated or even worn escapement, this is the main reason that this kind of watches doesn't work as long and reliable as the jeweled escapement ones. You can find many of them with no wear at the crown and case, and this is because they stopped working normally pritty soon after purchase.
    2 points
  10. I guess it is a possibility, but the train wheel bridge was pressed down all the way so I'm not so sure. Then again, the screws weren't tightened at all (imagine being screwed down all the way but using a piece of Rodico instead of a screwdriver). Anyway, the movement is now fully stripped so we'll have to see once I've assembled it again. BTW I found the post where @nickelsilver wrote about tightening screws: As he writes: "In school, if your screws aren't tight, like you think they might snap, you get your movement tossed in the sawdust box!" I'm really curious to know why it is so important to tighten the screws that hard. I usually stop when it feels like there is no chance the screw can start to unscrew itself. Also, screwing down that hard requires perfectly dressed and perfectly sized screwdrivers to avoid slippage and/or damaging the screw slot.
    1 point
  11. This place has them, cheaper than I saw on ebay and they appear to be a legitimate supplier: https://maddisonsofdurham.co.uk/watch-parts/capacitors/seiko-batteries-capacitors/seiko-capacitor-kinetic-30235mz-tc920s-5m42-5m22-5m23-battery-3023-5mz-3023-5my/?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjw7-SvBhB6EiwAwYdCASmviGb9G2ZGW3CtcUZBkNgglcgfPKoqnpOzrzruiPtm69f6DX7UGhoCKl4QAvD_BwE There is also a note at the bottom of the page about them being a newer type, with a slightly different part number.
    1 point
  12. Yes, I do have the Seitz pivot gauge which is worth a small fortune these days. Got mine for about £200 which I thought to be crazy expensive at the time, but I've now seen asking prices over twice that. And no, I do not have the scaled pin gauge, but it would be convenient. Let me know if you find them! Anyway, the Seitz pivot gauge is in my opinion not really necessary if you have the JKA Feintaster. It can measure even the very small pivots w/o making any dents. One will have to be a lot more careful when using the Bergeon micrometres.
    1 point
  13. Didn't you see the impact on your time machine? Nobody told me this / or read it in any books but whenever I have a reading like yours one of the first things I check is the plate screws and in the majority of the cases the readings get better after tightening them, smoothing out your curves. If they are tighten enough it makes no sense to tighten them more as it brings no benefit but excessive force might cause the screwheads to brake off. You have the feel for it after a while. I have seen cases where the plate screws were not tight on purpose just to sort out some end shake issues but needless to say that's not the right way to go. Plate screws must be tight enough just like the critical screws in automotive otherwise you screw up the whole movement in my opinion. I must stress that this is only my own opinion and i am just a hobbyist.
    1 point
  14. I remember when I was in school the instructor would use whale oil on some problematic little tiny ladies watches because he felt it was a better oil. then for my birthday on my friends gave me a bottle of vintage nye watch oil. Complete with the advertisement inside which I have scanned below and what I find interesting is it hasn't gone bad in the model and it is super super thin I'm guessing the viscosity of water basically. then somewhere in the discussion group within the last year or so somebody purchased one of these bottles off of eBay and was using it on their watch. After all a bottle watch oil is? Apparently it was an expensive I'm guessing or it's what they had or something no idea what the final outcome was other than I found it amusing. then somewhere in the Internet somewhat it made up this interesting chart down below. I believe the first natural oil is there 8000 oil. Notice the friction properties in the first two columns in other words it's really good at reducing friction better than anything else. But it does have additional specifications like contact angle which is almost never found in any spec sheet which has to do with how likely it is to spread. Big numbers are bad in those two columns and you can see spreading test it's very bad. So basically it's a really outstanding oil for a short period of time before it spreads away and of course being natural it has a habit of probably going bad very soon the best oil of course is Elgin oil at least the second version of their oil very good at reducing friction and very good at staying wherever you place it and still very fluid oil viscosity wise. then one of the most famous oils of all Swiss 9010 that I personally don't like and don't use quite a ways down on the chart personally prefer 9020 which unfortunately is not listed on this chart. It slightly heavier viscosity and has a little nicer contact angle those more likely to stay wherever you put it versus 9010 which universally requires epilam if you would like to stay wherever you putting it. then if you're in the viscosities here's an interesting chart that I found on the discussion group. ou will note there some minor variations between the viscosities listed here and the chart up above which may be attributed to the difference in temperature universally everything is supposed to be at 20° C and the chart up above is at 40° C. Because what becomes interesting on the chart is 8000 is listed out of viscosity of 95 which does agree with their technical information and the PDF for the oil lists at 40° it is 41 where up above the chart everything is either listed as 50 or light whatever that means? Then Elgin oil is listed on the chart in a clever interesting way. you look on the chart at a viscosity of 125 you'll find Dr. Tillwich LGN oil which is the synthetic version of Elgin oil. Many years ago they had a request and gathered up a whole bunch of samples and synthesize the oil and for a while it was available for sale although it was rather expensive I had seen a bottle for about $100. and as far as viscosities go it does appear to be right in both charts in other words at 20° it's 125 and at 40° it's 50. So unfortunately it brings up the problem of viscosity or better yet contact angle determines the spread ability of your lubrication unfortunately we typically don't get contact angle we just get viscosity. So the casual trend is a heavier oil tends to not spread although as we can see from looking at the chart that isn't hundred percent true. As far as reducing friction goes viscosity doesn't necessarily come into play here either. Or basically we don't have enough of the right tech sheets to make a real proper comparison.
    1 point
  15. From what I’ve seen Rich below 0.1mm aren’t available unless maybe from a Swiss manufacturer I don’t know and I can easily imagine the price for 1 to be more than that whole Aliexpress set my next thought is that the really small sizes would be more likely found in ladies movements which we do less often? Maybe one of the professional guys we are so lucky to have here can help educate us? Tom
    1 point
  16. I have always had it in my mind that hairsprings can fatigue in just the same way as mainsprings can. If a hairspring has gone through a rough process of repair then its structure will have changed ( bending any metal backwards and forwards will cause micro fractures and eventually breakage ) in those areas of heavy manipulation. Its strength and elasticity is no longer linear over its full length so no longer isochronical.
    1 point
  17. The more common Jewel hole diameters are from about 0.07mm to 0.50mm. Those are the sizes in the Seitz jewel gauge tool.
    1 point
  18. Having recently acquired a JKA Feintaster myself I ordered a set of pin guages from Aliexpress. Randomly measuring them they look good. I am planning to get some jewels now to experiment with. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003664177054.html?spm=a2g0o.order_list.order_list_main.29.550018027e4OVW these are the ones I ordered, I also bought 100 plastic sample vials from amazon to organise jewels Tom
    1 point
  19. Funny that you should mention it! I just stripped the entire movement and when unscrewing the train wheel bridge, I noticed that I hadn't secured the screws. They weren't exactly loose, but not one bit tightened. However, the bridge was pressed down all the way. Before tightening the screws I always make sure the pivots are in the jewel holes and that everything spins freely and looks right. I simply must have forgotten to tighten the screws this time around. What kind of impact could this have had? I believe I remember @nickelsilver mentioning it "being a crime" (or something along those lines) not to tighten the screws very hard when he was in school. I didn't think much of it when I read it but perhaps it was a reason for it, no? As can be seen in the picture and hopefully in the video I tried to adjust the terminal curve to the best of my ability. Not perfect, but at least a bit better than it was. It had no real effect on the problem with the hugely varying rates between the horizontal and vertical positions though. So, I have decided to strip and re-service the movement. I only had the time to strip it tonight, but hopefully, I'll find the time to keep working on it in the coming days.
    1 point
  20. Pin levers, you gotta hate em to love em. Big Friendly Giants - lotsa wierd bits and pieces floating around making the job interesting . Great pictures Ross, you did well to ignore your timegrapher and showed great restraint not pebble dashing the wall behind you with its innards.
    1 point
  21. as you're grasping you want to be very careful what the definition of? in other words you can have the collet centered over the jewel hole and not actually have the hairspring centered.
    1 point
  22. Absolutely one or two pairs of brass tweezers are handy. There are also some metal alloy rweezers which are classed non magnetic.
    1 point
  23. @Qutadah, see, You first need to have the watch in You hands, or at least to have good pictures of the movement. What the seller says is useless, as if He understands enough of watchmaking, He would repair the watch. We need to see this hairspring, as it may be really bad, but it may be quite easily repairable too. And it concerns not only the hairspring, but all the other parts... The main problem that I see is that You intend to repair this small and fragile calibre without having any experience. Such attempts usually end up with ruined hairspring and/or broken pivots. Actually, the hairsprings end up ruined never by themselves, but only because someone did'nt handle them properly.
    1 point
  24. You can demagnetise the fully assembled watch, or just the movement, or if disassembled all the (steel) components individually. Obviously, the first option is the easiest, but sometimes the case is designed to shield the movement from magnetism. I doubt this is true with Elgin pocket watches, but as you are disassembling anyway, your best option would be to demagnetise the whole movement outside the case. There are a wide range of demagnetisers available, in all price classes. In my experience, the cheap blue ones with the red button work fine if used correctly.
    1 point
  25. Jon and VWatchie Thank you for the video facility in the PowerPoint. Very informative when you see the 'live' version of the written word. Helps beyond belief. Not tried to replace a jewel or setting yet. However, seeing the process adds to the overall learning.
    1 point
  26. I keep mine in the jugs they came in and mason jars. I've not had any issues with it evaporating past the seals. One Dip is the only watch cleaning chemical I've experienced that with. I usually do fives, but it's pretty arbitrary. However long it takes to get the job done without doing damage is fine. I usually turn the heater on when I start, but don't really wait for it to get there. I've done it cold as well, and haven't noticed any difference. Rinsing in IPA is probably not as good as the L&R rinse. I doubt it's undoing any of the cleaning progress made, but it's not really gaining you anything either.
    1 point
  27. Was the rust there before cleaning or only appeared after cleaning? I would find it strange if un-rusted parts began to rust after such a short exposure to water and then IPA/drying especially as the time the parts were wet and in air was so short. If the parts were already rusty then the treatment you outlined above is unlikely to remove it. I would advise against CLR as it is a general cleaner mainly made up of acids (lactic acid and gluconic acid) which will indiscriminately attack the part (rust and good steel alike), not a problem on a garden fence, but on a delicate watch component this could cause more issues than it solves (the same goes for coke - which someone is bound to mention at some point in this thread). I would use a commercial cleaner specifically designed for rust eg evapo-rust or similar. If the parts were not previously rusty, then I would follow the advice above from @oldhippy and move to non-water based dedicated cleaning products, actually I would follow this advice in either scenario. Again, a quick 5-20 min soak in dedicated rust removing solution should remove any staining caused by recent rust on the parts which have the problem now. Please see below from the L&R web site MSDS sheets, these professional cleaning products contain no water - maybe I misunderstood your comment? L&R 111 cleaning solution L&R #3 Rinse
    1 point
  28. The concoctions members use on here in order to clean their watch movements. I’m sorry if this sounds harsh, you only have yourself to blame. Use the proper cleaners and rinse that is what they are manufactured for. Read about them see what the pros say. Watch parts are very fragile, you can’t just plonk them in any solution.
    1 point
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