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Anyone familiar with Citizen 52**/54**/64** cals, as this one has me stumped?

mikepilk
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mikepilk Distinguished Member

mikepilk

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I've been trying on and off for months to get reasonable amplitude from a 33J Citizen Cal 5204. 

The gear train runs as freely as any watch I've cleaned, and the balance swings freely, no rubbing. 

I've inspected all jewels/pivots under the microscope, oiled as per Technical Guide.
Fitted new mainspring and balance (end-shake OK).  There are no cracked or loose jewels. Demagnetised

And yet I couldn't get above 180 - 200 deg amplitude, despite stripping, re-cleaning, re-examining all the parts (several times)

I never give up (though I might have to on this) . So I looked for another movement to start swapping parts.
 After weeks of searching I eventually found another cal 5204 movement (not common!)

The hole at the bottom of the barrel was worn, but the movement looked very good. 

So I cleaned/inspected/oiled this one, used the better barrel with the new mainspring from the first movement.

The gear train was beautifully free, the balance swung nicely, all was looking great ......... and I get 190 deg amplitude!

I just can't see where the problem is. Does anyone have experience of these models, who could suggest some ideas ?

This could be the first one to beat me :thumbsd:

 

WIN_20190202_12_54_45_Pro.jpg

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WIN_20190212_13_42_05_Pro.jpg

WIN_20190212_13_41_57_Pro.jpg

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rogart63 Distinguished Member

rogart63

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Have the same problem. Think it was a 5470 . Can't figure out the problem. Not sure about the lift angle. Did you try to set it to 46 degree.  If so how did that affect the amplitud?

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mikepilk Distinguished Member

mikepilk

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41 minutes ago, rogart63 said:

Have the same problem. Think it was a 5470 . Can't figure out the problem. Not sure about the lift angle. Did you try to set it to 46 degree.  If so how did that affect the amplitud?

So I'm not the only one! 

Unfortunately setting 46 degrees makes it worse. I wasn't sure the timegrapher was correct so I put a mark on the balance, and it agreed. 

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rogart63 Distinguished Member

rogart63

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Have a watch that i am going to service in the near future. I hope i can get it to run okay. Need a new balance for it as the hairspring is badly damaged. The wheel train  is running smooth so hopefully it will be fine. 

The other i did that i couldn't get to work is now spare parts :) . The owner didn't want to pay as much for it . I found out the hairspring stud was damaged . So that also needed a balance. But there was other things wrong with it to. 

One thing that i wonder about is the double wheel . That has two wheels on one axle . Only  of  gears are is in contact with an other wheels gear.  

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mikepilk Distinguished Member

mikepilk

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24 minutes ago, rogart63 said:

Have a watch that i am going to service in the near future. I hope i can get it to run okay. Need a new balance for it as the hairspring is badly damaged. The wheel train  is running smooth so hopefully it will be fine. 

The other i did that i couldn't get to work is now spare parts :) . The owner didn't want to pay as much for it . I found out the hairspring stud was damaged . So that also needed a balance. But there was other things wrong with it to. 

One thing that i wonder about is the double wheel . That has two wheels on one axle . Only  of  gears are is in contact with an other wheels gear.  

I can't figure out that double wheel. It looks like both wheels mesh with the sweep second pinion! 

I managed to get a new balance quite cheaply. The problem was finding the part number. 

Have a look here, basically the same movement and good amplitude 

https://mitka.co.uk/2019/05/20/service-citizen-150m-diver-68-5372/#more-12743

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rogart63 Distinguished Member

rogart63

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4 hours ago, mikepilk said:

I can't figure out that double wheel. It looks like both wheels mesh with the sweep second pinion! 

I managed to get a new balance quite cheaply. The problem was finding the part number. 

Have a look here, basically the same movement and good amplitude 

https://mitka.co.uk/2019/05/20/service-citizen-150m-diver-68-5372/#more-12743

Have one of those here also in parts. Have serviced a couple of those and they are running good with great amp. Think it was 270 -280 . Don't know why the 5470 is running so bad.  If it's the 21600 Hz instead of the 5470 18000 hz  

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mikepilk Distinguished Member

mikepilk

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I think the problem could be play in the barrel arbor. One barrel had holes which were badly worn.
Even with the one that seemed OK,  I can tilt the barrel a bit when it's installed. With it on the timegrapher I can get the amplitude going from about 190 to 220 deg by tilting the edge of the barrel with some pegwood. I think that's a clue !  

The power does go through the sweep second pinion (seems odd) - which takes it from the bottom third wheel to the top one.

So it's worth checking that the sweep second pinion is fitting ok, and oiled.

 

image.png.437037172971b098a415ceb34cc516ae.png

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saswatch88 WRT Addict

saswatch88

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On 5/21/2019 at 6:48 AM, mikepilk said:

I can't figure out that double wheel. It looks like both wheels mesh with the sweep second pinion! 

I managed to get a new balance quite cheaply. The problem was finding the part number. 

Have a look here, basically the same movement and good amplitude 

https://mitka.co.uk/2019/05/20/service-citizen-150m-diver-68-5372/#more-12743

Citizens dont always yield the best amplitudes but none the less 180-200 is still too low - if both movements were serviced with no broken jewels or excess wear and they both dont have good amp then like any experiment we have to see what was the constant here. The barrel and mainspring right, so an educated guess would say there lies your problem. This is the beauty of having two movements to work with. I know you posted on this before about ordering a new mainspring and barrel, and if i recall the one that was pulled was a stronger strength than the OEM one. Then there was an issue with breaking grease, correct me if iam wrong here.

I would say this: It was very common for old watchmakers to replace mainsprings with one that had a higher strength to account for amplitude issues due to wear, i work on old pocket watches and you will find that there are mainsprings designed for the same movement with usually 3-4 different strengths available from the factory. When I service a 50-100 year old movement i replace it with a mainspring that is at least 2/100th stronger than what was in there originally. try that, if that dont work then my next guess would be the hairspring, they too wear down and loose strength over the years, but a stronger MS should help with that as well but how much in your case i wouldnt know.

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mikepilk Distinguished Member

mikepilk

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I did put in a slightly stronger mainspring, and yes, I did post about breaking grease. In confident its now winding enough before slipping. 

There are some new barrels on sale but I can't find the part number. If anyone has a parts list? 

I also fitted a new balance, so it's not the hairspring 

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