Is it salvageable?

[RyMoeller]

I wish I had more projects to report on but things have really bogged down lately as I continue to bite of more than I can chew.  I'm in the middle of three long term projects (the Favre Leuba Bivouac going on year three) and am running short of workbench space.  I'm in the middle of changing out the engine in my wife's Mini Cooper too (that's another story but if you own a Mini- be sure and replace the timing chain guides!) and that has really eaten into my "fun time".

I thought I'd bring this one to the board for comments before I'm underwater- it's an old Gallet from the 60's.  Do you think it can be salvaged?

We clearly have some water damaged however, the seconds hand will move if the crown is given a little pressure. 

Water entered in through the chronograph buttons and the pendant tube.  I haven't tried depressing the buttons- I think that would just lead to bits snapping and rust moving about.

I'll need a new stem for sure...

The dial actually looks quite good.

I wonder what it looks like underneath though...

It's not terrible, but it's not great either.  Most of the rust damage is concentrated in the keyless works.

There's a bit of damage to the hour recording mechanism...

That's as far as I've gotten thus far.  The screw for the Operating Lever is rusted tight and is now being treated with a bit of penetrating oil.  Once removed I can pull the second pusher button out and remove the movement from the case.  I'll know the full extent of the damage once it's in a pile of bits and pieces.

This is an Excelsior Park EP40-68 movement.  I've wanted to work on one of these for quite a while but couldn't afford a proper working piece. Excelsior Park parts are difficult to source though so I may not be able to bring this one back to life.

[Hamish]

Hi, I guess anything can be salvaged, but at a reasonable cost?....these watches seem quite popular at the moment so I certainly think it is worth a good try. I think this type of thing can be very rewarding as well.

Its hard to tell what components have rusted too far as to be usable, but I think you are on the right track with using a small amount of penetrol etc. The dial might clean up nicely with a light touch of Rodico (take care).

Personally I would also clean any springs carefully and rub down to a flatter finish to avoid stress risers which lead to breakage over time.

Nice project

[Nucejoe]

Yes it is, providing you don,t make fun of me.

Remove balance and its jewels. Drop the rest in a jar full of cocacola, close the lid.

Next day, hold under faucet tap water and brush with a scrap tooth brush.

You will be astonished, but that is Ok. If you like to repeat.

Try to unscrew the screws, no force, chances of you getting astonished again are better than 99%. 

You may like to continue with paint thinnner or carburator cleaner. If you are not satisfied, we go to next process.

Regards 

[clockboy]

All watches are salvageable if you can source replacement parts. Removing rust is OK but the rusted part has been corroded so the part is damaged. 

[oldhippy]

It’s a bit like asking how long is a piece of string.

As others have said. Depends on available parts, how skilled are you; any part that is eaten with rust must be re-placed. Then it’s the cost. Have you looked for a re-placement movement for parts?

[AndyHull]

Quote

Do you think it can be salvaged?

I've seen worse, however it is a bit like your Mini. Yes you can fix it if you want to, but you will need to invest a fair bit of time in it.
Everything is fixable if you have enough time and money.

Would I attempt it if I had a similar basket case?

Probably yes. Eventually, when I had the time.
 

[vinn3]

  removing rust is always  a sad project.   that watch was was very collectable at one time, kind of a cheepy.   sell the mini and and the  watch?   vin

[Greybeard]

I wish I had more projects to report on but things have really bogged down lately as I continue to bite of more than I can chew.  I'm in the middle of three long term projects (the Favre Leuba Bivouac going on year three) and am running short of workbench space.  I'm in the middle of changing out the engine in my wife's Mini Cooper too (that's another story but if you own a Mini- be sure and replace the timing chain guides!) and that has really eaten into my "fun time".
I thought I'd bring this one to the board for comments before I'm underwater- it's an old Gallet from the 60's.  Do you think it can be salvaged?

We clearly have some water damaged however, the seconds hand will move if the crown is given a little pressure. 

Water entered in through the chronograph buttons and the pendant tube.  I haven't tried depressing the buttons- I think that would just lead to bits snapping and rust moving about.
I'll need a new stem for sure...

The dial actually looks quite good.


I wonder what it looks like underneath though...

It's not terrible, but it's not great either.  Most of the rust damage is concentrated in the keyless works.

There's a bit of damage to the hour recording mechanism...

That's as far as I've gotten thus far.  The screw for the Operating Lever is rusted tight and is now being treated with a bit of penetrating oil.  Once removed I can pull the second pusher button out and remove the movement from the case.  I'll know the full extent of the damage once it's in a pile of bits and pieces.
This is an Excelsior Park EP40-68 movement.  I've wanted to work on one of these for quite a while but couldn't afford a proper working piece. Excelsior Park parts are difficult to source though so I may not be able to bring this one back to life.

OMG That is a long term project good luck i believe anything is salvageable depending on cost and availability of parts


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[yankeedog]

Watch seals are like timing chain guides.Looking at this , I would think that it is doable.The thing that scares me most is the screws. Rusty ones snap off real easy. How patient are you , and how deep are your pockets?

[yankeedog]

9 hours ago, Nucejoe said:

Yes it is, providing you don,t make fun of me.

Remove balance and its jewels. Drop the rest in a jar full of cocacola, close the lid.

Next day, hold under faucet tap water and brush with a scrap tooth brush.

You will be astonished, but that is Ok. If you like to repeat.

Try to unscrew the screws, no force, chances of you getting astonished again are better than 99%. 

You may like to continue with paint thinnner or carburator cleaner. If you are not satisfied, we go to next process.

Regards 

My Grandmother always told me Coca Cola was not fit for human consumption, and that it was "paint remover" .I never saw her touch it or drink a drop of water. She lived to be 93.

[Johnnie]

As kids we used to drop old pennies in coca cola, leave overnight and have bright clean pennies in the morning.

[ro63rto]

Marks video on sorting out a rusty movement might help

[RyMoeller]

Ah, thanks for all of the responses thus far!  I expected a lot of positive feedback and the community did not disappoint.  Of course this being the Watch Repair Forum I'm sure there are a lot of members who think the same way I do, "I saw it was broke, I knew I could fix it. I went to work."

I'm really intrigued with the Coca-Cola idea too.  I imagine it's the phosphoric acid that works on the rust but I'm a little apprehensive about soaking the movement since it's an aqueous solution- would the steel free of rust fair well if submerged?  Incidentally, I've heard that Coca-Cola is also useful for removing oil stains from the garage floor- although I haven't tried that either.

A quick update for Wednesday- the Operating Lever screw is in bad shape so I'm letting it soak a bit longer before giving it a second try. Rusty as it is, I might have to cut off the screw head off to release the Operating Lever. This is the first (of several probably) hurdles.

You may have figured out that my plan is to restore the watch and with that in mind I've already sourced some of the necessary parts. It appears that the pivots for the Going Train are undamaged and the Balance Assembly is also in good shape. Considering this, I think it's  a good candidate for reanimation.

This will be a fun project so I'm going to document the progress on the thread here.  Projects like this can be long term- especially if parts are unavailable or need to be fabricated (as an example, I'm currently on the fourth iteration of the bezel click for the Favre Leuba on my workbench- the click is unavailable so a replacement has to be fabricated) so this may be a long thread.

Based on the comments, most seem to agree that question of whether or not to salvage comes down to the cost of repair measured against market value; the latter must be greater than the former although by how much is debatable. With this in mind, I'll be transparent and detail the cost of repair as I go forward. I'll detail the cost of each part replaced and although my labor is free, I'll try to keep a running total of the hours spent on the project as well.  As a starting point we have the cost of the watch- 710 USD when I acquired it in September of last year.

A good measure of the top line value of the watch can be ascertained by keeping an eye on the eBay auction here here. This Multichron is almost identical to mine but clearly never went through the laundry. As a disclaimer- I have no affiliation with the seller or the time piece; being an open auction I just figured it's a handy method of determining market value. It will be interesting to see how close the cost of my watch (once restored) comes to the sale price of the auction item.

[nickelsilver]

Marks video on sorting out a rusty movement might help

That's a great vid but this watch has much deeper damage. If the actual going train survived (they do sometimes in these cases, amazingly) it may function with a lot of work and some parts. If the train pinions, staff, and hs are rusted it's probably a goner.

[eezy]

Could not afford Coca Cola as kids so used to nick Dad's HP brown sauce - same effect.

[yankeedog]

vinegar works well on rust.

[ro63rto]

vinegar works well on rust.

Plain white vinegar, nothing fancier

[AndyHull]

+1 for plain white vinegar on rust. Cola does work, but has too many other things in it, sugars, secret sauces... cocaine .. no, maybe I'm thinking of potential leaders of the Conservative partly with that last one, but it used to have cocaine in it.

White vinegar also cleans up silvered Timex dials to some extent too. It is relatively gentle, so you can control the process quite well. 

[watchweasol]

Hi   as the guys say anything is doable if you invest the time and maybe a bob or two, As Nucejoe says try the cola method there is not a lot to ad to the advise given, follow it and you will get there, Take plenty of pictures and notes as you progress they will be indispensible when re building the watch. wish you good luck on your endeavour.

[RyMoeller]

Okay, time for an update-

I've disassembled the movement and been able to take an inventory of the damaged parts.  Things are not quite as bad as they initially looked although there is one area of concern.  Here's the pictures:

 

[watchweasol]

Err No pictures?

[RyMoeller]

Oops, hit the "Submit" button instead of the "insert Media" button!

So first off- the Operating Lever was badly rusted as was the Flyback Lever and Sliding Gear Spring.  These parts are not salvageable.

Quite a bit of rust was left on the plate too after removing these bits.  That's too bad as the top plate has a nice Geneva Stripe pattern on it.  Hopefully I'll be able to clean the residue off.

Bits of rust had made their way all throughout the movement.

The biggest concern thus far is the Center Wheel though.  It had some rust damage on the top pivot.  I'm going to try and clean this up but I may have to look for a replacement wheel.

Under the dial, the keyless works saw quite a bit of rust staining.

Amazingly, almost all of the rust here came from the stem and pushers.  The gears for the keyless work, including the

had only minor damage.

Underneath the top plate was quite a bit of rust residue.

The Main Plate had quite a bit of rust staining as well.  Some of this will clean up, but the silver plating has been damaged as well so there is only so much that can be done.

The chronograph buttons and the stem are in a bad way. This is what they looked like after several hours in Coca-Cola (well, Diet Coke actually).

Here's the full inventory of replacement parts needed thus far:

1. Operating Lever
2. Flyback Lever
3. Sliding Gear Spring
4. Minute Recording Jumper
5. Stem

I can probably turn replacement shafts for the chronograph pushers on the lathe but since one button was damaged as well (or at least very well worn) I purchased replacements off eBay.

A replacement stem is coming from Jules Borel for $13.50 and for $300 I got a lot of New Old Stock parts from a seller on eBay.  This included the Operating Lever, Flyback Lever, Sliding Gear Spring, and Minute Recording Jumper plus seventeen additional parts and five coil springs for the pushers. It was a good deal considering most of these parts can't be had from the normal supply houses anymore.

So that puts the total cost thus far at $1014.50.  I've also put about six hours of work into the project- most of it on cleaning rust and removing rusted screws.

This  morning I decided to purchase replacement buttons as well even though the cost is a budget breaker.  They'll be about $90 a piece but their New Old  Stock as well.

I should have some more pictures up shortly as I begin reassembly.

 

[RyMoeller]

1 minute ago, watchweasol said:

Err No pictures?

Just got them up!

[watchweasol]

Hi RY   looks like an up hill task, careful application of a fibergass brush will probably clean up the plates  a bit,  You have a bit of a job on there it will be time consuming I wish you well on your endeavour keep us posted on the progress.

[RyMoeller]

Well, I spent quite a bit of time with it today (about six hours), extracting the rusted shaft of the screw for the Sliding Gear Spring, polishing the other screws, and repairing the Center Wheel and I finally have the base movement back together.

The Mainspring was in fine shape, so I reused it.

Other than the Center Wheel, the pivots in the going train were untouched by rust. Again, this was a relief because sourcing the various bits of the going train just may be impossible

One of the interesting features of an Excelsior Park  movement is the Fourth Wheel/Chronograph Driving Wheel arrangement. In most chronographs the Fourth Wheel has an extended pivot that the Chronograph Driving Wheel is mounted on- it's usually a friction fitted. Excelsior Park instead designed a double-decker arrangement where the Fourth Wheel and Chronograph Driving Wheel are both permanently mounted on the same pinion. A separate cock secures the wheel(s) to the Main Plate.

Another thing I really like about this movement is how the milled springs and small bridges have little "clover leafs" that extend outward from the edges. These leaves fit into cutouts in the plate and that ensures the bridges and springs are always oriented just right  before you screw them down. You can see the leaves extending from the edge of the Pallet Bridge in the picture below.

Little things like this also catch my eye- the cap jewels have a small circular trough cut into the bottom of the jewel. I just can't wrap my mind around how that's accomplished with such precision.

It took quite a bit of time to get the base movement back together. The plates went through the cleaner multiple times and much elbow grease was needed to remove the rust damage. The screw for the Sliding Gear Spring took about two hours to extract this morning. A lot of other screws were cleaned up with the help of the lathe too.  In the end, I don't think I'll have to replace many.

The Balance Assembly got quite a lot of attention too.  The hairspring was fouled with bits of rust and other muck that must have been carried in by the water that caused all the rust damage.  It was cleaned with lighter fluid and a steady hand then went through the cleaner with the top and bottom plate this morning.

I do like the design of the entire escapement in this movement also. Excelsior Park movements are some of the earliest Swiss movements I've seen to use an adjustable stud for the hairspring- this makes beat error adjustment quite simple. Here we have a screwless Balance Wheel too and one with an Breguet hairspring.  All good stuff.

In order to test the movement I needed to assemble the keyless works as well.  There's a lot of scarring here but I was able to reuse everything but the Stem.

So I finished the day by giving the movement a good wind and popping it on the Timegrapher-

Mind you that's the reading at full wind in one position but it's a good starting point.