Need help learning to make a dogleg in hairspring

[Lc130]

Hi All

I'm a beginner with a history of mangling hairsprings and worse record trying to correct them.  Using scrap hairsprings, I'm trying to learn to make a dogleg. I recently learned that replacement balances often require them. 

With the HS off the balance, I grip it with Dumont 55 tweezers.  Trying to keep that tweezer vertical, I push the HS away from the collet.  The problem is that I always end up with the end of the HS twisted upward.  I can't find much on this other than Mark's correcting a HS videos (he makes it look easy).  Any help is appreciated.

Thank you

Charlie

 

[saswatch88]

Marks video is best video in my opinion on this matter and any other on HS correcting. When manipulating a hairspring, angle of tweezers is very important, a HS is not round but flat so your angle must be off. With that being said, correcting hairsprings is one of those things that cant really be explained or learned with words or videos, you just have to practice practice practice 

Edited January 20, 2020 by saswatch88

[jdm]

6 hours ago, Lc130 said:

With the HS off the balance, I grip it with Dumont 55 tweezers.  Trying to keep that tweezer vertical, I push the HS away from the collet.  The problem is that I always end up with the end of the HS twisted upward. 

If something can be humanly done, it can be explained in words, with the help of a couple of illustrations maybe. I think that happens because:

1. Is very difficult to work with straight tweezers vertical and very close. 

2. The bending tweezers must not be exactly vertical to its center, rather the edge that forms the bend must be. Of course, the two lines do not concide because the tips are tapered.

So what I do, and suggest that you try is to use curved or angled tips tweezers to hold, and a straight one to bend.

Also, even if commonly used to correct minor distortion, No. 5 tweezers are not ideal for forming dogleg, flattening kinks, not to mention overcoils. The specific types for that have been subject of an extensive topic where Master nickelsilver explained and set the record straight: these are not made anymore. 

So, as also suggested by others, we have to make our own by accurately filing a standard pair, something that is not very easy either.

Based on the considerations above I think the best shape would be having the tip sides (looking at the front) to be parallel, maybe 1 or 1.2mm wide, while in side view thickness should be reduced, with a slight taper on the nose to help sliding in between the coils.

I have not made yet a pair like the above, but intend to do that at the first chance, and will post pictures here and update with my experience. 

Edited January 20, 2020 by jdm

[saswatch88]

As we all know, well some of us, you cant master something by reading or looking at diagrams. Although marks videos are amazing you still really dont know how much pressure he is using what degree of rotation etc. when mark says “light pressure” your idea of light pressure will most likely be different than his. Hence why hairspring bending is not something that is easily explained/learned by watching someone else perform the task. Mark makes it look easy kinda like how Bob Ross makes painting look easy, until you try to do one of his paintings while actually watching an episode and it just doesn’t come out the same. Lol yes That was me. So again suffices to say practice with all its failures and lessons learned is the way to do it.

If you having a hard time with vertical positioning using straight tweezers, you can try using #6 and #7 tweezers. I use #6 for holding and #7 for bending. #5 and other hairspring tools are good for minor manipulation in instances where the bending or shaping does not require grabbing any of the coils. Also i just want to point out when making a dog leg you must take into account the positioning and path of the regulating pins, as mark clearly demonstrates in his video.

Edited January 20, 2020 by saswatch88

[watchweasol]

Hi  for manipulating balance springs I made a pair of tools from large sewing needles, the point fitted into a handle or dowel and the head of the eye stoned off leaving a narrow fork with wich you manipulate the spring. These are not my invention but somthing I got out of a watchmaking book and with care they do work, They are not a substitute for tweezers but an addition to use whilst engaging in the black art of balance spring work.

[nickelsilver]

In school we had curved tweezers and #5. It was up to each student to find what they were comfortable with; most ended up just using the 5s. We started with large springs, like from Big Ben alarm clocks, working down to little bitty ones. First we would straighten out a coil totally straight, then recurve it. Then we formed letters of the alphabet (really, haha). The spring needed to stay flat through all of this. Then the teacher would take a virgin spring and introduce errors in the round, and in the flat, which we had to correct. This was over a couple of weeks. When we could comfortably fix springs that had no collet or stud or anything, we would start making corrections in the watch. When we could do that, we finally learned to vibrate them.

 

There are springs to be found on Ebay and from some of the material suppliers; it's very worthwhile to get some and spend some time figuring things out and gaining skill.

[saswatch88]

7 hours ago, watchweasol said:

Hi  for manipulating balance springs I made a pair of tools from large sewing needles, the point fitted into a handle or dowel and the head of the eye stoned off leaving a narrow fork with wich you manipulate the spring. These are not my invention but somthing I got out of a watchmaking book and with care they do work, They are not a substitute for tweezers but an addition to use whilst engaging in the black art of balance spring work.

I made a few of these too using pegwood, but i have a vintage set that has one that is sorta shaped like an L except the bottom point sticks straight up when tool is vertical, this tools works wonders when trying to separate coils or trying to widen them.

7 hours ago, nickelsilver said:

First we would straighten out a coil totally straight, then recurve it. 

Iam curious how you did this. I once watched a video when a guy took a hairspring that where the coils where touching on one side and way apart on the other, and he put a pin through the collet then grabbed the stud with a pair of tweezer then pulled it all the way out straight, he then let it wind back up slowly and when he was done the HS was perfectly round, it was unbelievable, i tried doing this myself but can never get it right, its def an art, think the angle he did it plays a big role in his success but just can never seem to get it down.

[Lc130]

Thanks all.  I've ordered a pack of 40 large hairsprings for learning.  Suspect I'll need many more.

[nickelsilver]

16 hours ago, saswatch88 said:

 

Iam curious how you did this. I once watched a video when a guy took a hairspring that where the coils where touching on one side and way apart on the other, and he put a pin through the collet then grabbed the stud with a pair of tweezer then pulled it all the way out straight, he then let it wind back up slowly and when he was done the HS was perfectly round, it was unbelievable, i tried doing this myself but can never get it right, its def an art, think the angle he did it plays a big role in his success but just can never seem to get it down.

I suspect that was a camera trick, I would say that's pretty much impossible.

 

We would straighten out one coil, like one turn of spring. Then recurve it. It wouldn't be perfect, but it was a good exercise in manipulation. Especially in keeping things flat.

[Marc]

17 hours ago, saswatch88 said:

I once watched a video when a guy took a hairspring that where the coils where touching on one side and way apart on the other, and he put a pin through the collet then grabbed the stud with a pair of tweezer then pulled it all the way out straight, he then let it wind back up slowly and when he was done the HS was perfectly round

Be warned, this technique is apparently called "Prima Aprilis"

I love how at about 2:48 the spring magically jumps out to the end of the tweezers 

Edited January 21, 2020 by Marc
Additional comment

[saswatch88]

That was one of the videos i saw. it is not easily done

I just want to add that when doing hairspring work it must be done on a somewhat soft surface, not a hard surface, it makes it easier to hold the hairspring in place when making adjustment esp when trying to get vertical, bench mats are ideal. It allows the tips to dig in a bit giving you a better grab/stability and also ensures you dont grab it where tips catch an edge and create an unwanted bend esp in the case of the OP where the outer coil ends up sticking up.

Edited January 21, 2020 by saswatch88

[nickelsilver]

15 hours ago, saswatch88 said:

That was one of the videos i saw. it is not easily done

 

It's not too hard with fairly simple video editing software.

[saswatch88]

3 hours ago, nickelsilver said:

It's not too hard with fairly simple video editing software.

Glad to know it was just not me sucking