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Another newbie


alanmason

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Hi WRT forum members,

I am a newbie to watch repair, based it the UK, I have changed batteries and adjusted bracelets in the past. I am starting out with a modest budget using Amazon tools and eBay movements, as time and ability progress I intend to upgrade to better quality tools. I bought a bag of cheap scrap movements which turned out to be from ladies watches and were tiny, not a great place to start, have dismantled them but there is no way I can rebuild them with my ability as they are so small. Next I have moved on to a vintage pocket watch, a much better size but after a bit of research I now realise that an Ingersoll pin palate watch is not the best first choice of watch as  they are fiddly to rebuild. I have managed to rebuild it and get it from a non runner to a working movement (with some problems that I'll save for another post).

Future projects include

7S26 movement (non runner) overhaul

Elgin or Waltham pocket watch overhaul

Build a watch from eBay with full strip down of movement

Seiko SKX007 / SKX013 various mods

That lot should keep me busy for a few months, I'm off now to practice my tweezer control (ping)

Best regards to you all

Alan

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    • Hello everybody, sorry for the late reply. Thank you all so much for your help and your tips. I got lucky and found a replacement wheel bridge for cheap which actually ended up being in decent condition. I decided not to do anything about the mainspring barrel pivot since I didn't have the right tools and the barrel didn't have much endshake anyhow. I am happy to report that the watch now runs great, I have regulated it to about +-10/s day which is fine by my standards. The timegrapher result looks decent as well, although beat error is around 0.6ms which could be better I suppose. Amplitude reaches over 230 quite consistently which I'm happy with also. My lighter fluid has also been replaced by balance spring cleaning solution and now the springs don't stick to themselves anymore - who would have thought. I'm super happy with this watch, it might not be worth a whole lot but it's awesome that I could restore it and it makes me wear it with pride. To me it's a genuinely good lucking watch, it'll be my daily driver for a while. Thanks again to everybody for their input! I couldn't have done the repair without your help.   Here are some images for those interested, the bracelet isn't original but I don't really mind:    
    • Balance-hairspring system is oscillator with big Q-factor. When all in the movement is OK, the rate (frequency) is verry close to the own resonant frequency of the balance-hairspring. But in some cases, the movement (with foult) will force the resonator to work on pritty different frequency, sometimes faster, and sometimes slower. When this happens, the amplitude is always weak. So, the first thing to ask is what is the amplitude. If it is more than 180 and the hairspring doesn't touch itself and anything else, then for sure it is 'short'. If the amplitude is weak, then the first thing to do is to understand why and rectify the problem. At this time no point to check timekeeping. But, if one doubts that the hairspring is not correct, then He needs to calcullate the rate of the movement, then to 'vibrate' the balance-hairspring out of the movement and to measure the free oscillations frequency (period) with timer in order to ensure that they comply with the rate. If we have pictures, then it will be easier to tell something about that wheel.
    • So much work has gone into this! Thanks again @Jon. I will go back and check my adjustments from last weekend. A few questions for you, if you don't mind. In the reset position, I can understand the problem if the gap between the hammer and the minute counter heart is too big (slide 77) but what is bad about both hammers being in contact with the cams (slide 76)? I read somewhere that Landeron recommended grease on the runner cam, but the minute counter heart should be dry. Is that so, and why? How many tads in a ligne?
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