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Made Another Balance Staff

jdrichard
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jdrichard Distinguished Member

jdrichard

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Cut another balance staff for an old British Pocket watch. Again used a piece of blued steel and cut 90% of the staff before breaking it off and flipping it around to finish the rolled table end and the lower pivot.31323cf47250603e868d329058c31523.jpg10bb56123418ec712defa3a6355a00dc.jpg9657b24a00da3c6e65bb444d2a2bbaf8.jpgc4dd55e98f96cc3f9f8e501334f7d332.jpgMeasuring the upper jewel hole with a pivot gauge.c90bf97bd859fa893c0cb11c3350e383.jpg547624baeb3a22a4e131ddb3e67dedc4.jpgbe261222e8f57e43eadf9ba7849ad673.jpg5d28b4ec69be49edf16c083d4284f95b.jpgd79a75831a39d38741a5d64709478f65.jpgf23c437ea8dc079130fa5751f5627314.jpgc78dbbe2fc01e4dd91a7a2374606a166.jpgb4214116ab4a4accb98df20e375a936d.jpg

 

 

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oldhippy Distinguished Member

oldhippy

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Your confidence grows with each success.:Bravo: You should advertise in watch magazines. With your skills, you could make a lot of money. There are very few that have the skill you have. Loads of watch repairers, very few watchmakers.  Nice clear photos too.   

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Koen Watch Enthusiast

Koen

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Nice job man, don't thing I could do that!

Your movies helped me a lot with my first 2 pocket watches, lucky they still worked before I take them apart and were compleet.

The Hebdomas ( still not started with that one ) like you have is missing his bezel, but if I see how you make this small parts, it must be possible for someone to make a bezel to???

 

Keep posting movies and pictures.

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jdrichard Distinguished Member

jdrichard

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Your confidence grows with each success.:Bravo: You should advertise in watch magazines. With your skills, you could make a lot of money. There are very few that have the skill you have. Loads of watch repairers, very few watchmakers.  Nice clear photos too.   

Thanks. Not sure how I would advertise? I actually love making balance staffs. The new DSZ-70 stereo microscope is great for examining my work and seeing any defects in the parts. Still cutting the part with x20 loupe however. Here is my messy deskf9e95bca19e3c47242cfe87c6406e713.jpg


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jdrichard Distinguished Member

jdrichard

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Nice job man, don't thing I could do that!
Your movies helped me a lot with my first 2 pocket watches, lucky they still worked before I take them apart and were compleet.
The Hebdomas ( still not started with that one ) like you have is missing his bezel, but if I see how you make this small parts, it must be possible for someone to make a bezel to???
 
Keep posting movies and pictures.

I think this could be done out of brass with a three/four jaw chuck. The threading would be very tricky...unless you do snap on.


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Tmuir Distinguished Member

Tmuir

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Nicely done.

I've only made 1 balance staff so far.

I've got a German aircraft clock that has a broken endcap jewel that also had both ends of the pivots worn flat. I've rounded them again and once I've received the new reamers for my jeweling tool and fitted the new endstone I will find out if I will be making my second balance staff as it may now have too much endshake.

jdrichard Distinguished Member

jdrichard

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Nicely done.
I've only made 1 balance staff so far.
I've got a German aircraft clock that has a broken endcap jewel that also had both ends of the pivots worn flat. I've rounded them again and once I've received the new reamers for my jeweling tool and fitted the new endstone I will find out if I will be making my second balance staff as it may now have too much endshake.

Good job. It’s all about the next adventure:)


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jdrichard Distinguished Member

jdrichard

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Excellent, I'm jealous!. Would love to try myself, but a few problems, got no lathe, and probably not steady enough. 

Lathes are easy to get on eBay. Then al you need is some tools and a steady hand.


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oldhippy Distinguished Member

oldhippy

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1 hour ago, jdrichard said:


Lathes are easy to get on eBay. Then al you need is some tools and a steady hand.


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Not that easy. You need to know a bit about them, other wise you could waste you're money and end up with a real turkey. 

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      A little bit of superglue and you'll be good to go Although maybe if you had a laser welder you can weld the spring back together. Typically I've only seen it on blued steel Springs and on one occasion a modern spring? The modern watch was a Rolex watch that came and that was literally filled with rust including the barrel was filled with rust in the spring was in a whole bunch of little pieces. I have to wonder if that was an aftermarket mainspring . Then I'm attaching a PDF the Elgin watch company as you can see instigated a study in the 30s find out why mainsprings were breaking. I do though wonder if perhaps there may be a flaw in their study? One other things I wonder about is the metallurgy of the early steel Springs versus the later generation of blued steel Springs whether the metallurgy as part of the problem but in a case they did a study and have attaching a PDF. Because of the study any time I do anything with the blued steel spring when I actually cannot get something that's not blued. Once the spring is cleaned I'm very careful to not to touch the spring with my fingers because I don't want to have a problem with the chemicals on your fingers causing rust and I very carefully get lubrication back on the spring as fast as possible just to avoid these unpleasant situations. Then yes it is interesting one minute you of functional spring and the next minute you have lots of little pieces of spring. For my own personal Elgin pocket watch I put a steel spring and in this happened I'm also guessing that when one layer breaks it sends a cascading shockwave through the spring and that's why it breaks all the way across because after all there is a lot of energy in the spring when it breaks. Oh and my theory on the metallurgy is based on things have improved and for the most part I don't think I've seen a shattered spring in quite some time.   Elgin_Mainsprings.PDF
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