Jump to content

Fitting loose minute hand


Recommended Posts

Hello,

I have a lovely antique cylinder escapement pocket watch that I've serviced and got running beautifully but now I have a problem with the minute hand falling off. I think it's known as a pin hole fitting hand. On measuring the hand it shows approx. 0.40mm, and then on measuring the arbor diameter with the vernier guage, it's also 0.40mm so it's very near but won't even grip when mounted. Photos provided of the job.

Does anybody have a technique I can use to get the hand to fit?

20200509_164753800_iOS.jpg

20200509_170446185_iOS.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If a flat hand, I peen the hole, lay a piece of paper on a flat surface, place the hand on it, face down on the paper, you are to peen the back face of the hand, The art of this is to peen without scratching the face of the hand, bending or otherwise damaging it. If the hand is not flat, you should peen each flat side of the back seperately. The paper is obviously to help preserve the plating on the hand. Good luck.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks Nucejoe, I shall try that. To be fair I have nothing to lose. The hand is relatively flat so that’s good.@Watchweasol, I do have a staking set so could try peening gently with one of the larger domed punches.@Rodabod, I’m not 100% sure what the hand is made of. Looks like it could be steel though.

Thanks for the tips!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Link to comment
Share on other sites



  • Similar Content

  • Recently Browsing

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Topics

  • Posts

    • Well done, let us know how you get on with the citizen. 
    • @Neverenoughwatches Rich, I can only agree with you wholeheartedly. I spend a lot of time here learning all sorts and trying to make any little contribution to help others I can. Nothing can last forever and I wish I could do more to contribute to the forum financially and any other support I could.   Tom
    • This forum is a big part of my life. When I retired from horology many years ago due to poor health I missed what I had trained for. On here I can still do my bit in helping and advising others and have a little fun as well.  
    • First thing this morning, make coffee, second, check the forum.  I would really miss the forum, not on any social media, not interested in telling the world what I had for breakfast!!! I do consider most of the regulars friends and would wonder what had happened if they stopped posting. 
    • Hi all Thought I'd show my small and trying to keep under control watch collection! Apart from the Enicar all were under £12! At least if I destroy them in the process then I won't be too worse off. A few pics to start off with First of all my first attempt. A Thuya pocket watch. It was only running face down and would stop when vertical. So now it still works face down and only slows down when vertical so at least an improvement! 😄  I only have a generic watch oil at the mo so that won't help but I'm hoping to get some more appropriate oils in a couple of months for my birthday. I did have to get a crystal for it since it didn't come with one. It didn't look as though it would friction fit (and I don't have a crystal press in any case) so I glued it to the case with PVA. So far so good. Next up above are a sekonda and citizen automatic. Both non runners. Both with broken balance wheels amongst other things. I'm hopeful the citizen will start when I get the new one I ordered but the sekonda is being kept for spares and trial of new techniques. And finally the Enicar and the timemaster. Both running when I got them. I wanted to get running watches so that at least I stood a fighting chance of still having a running watch after the service! It was all going well on the Enicar until I dropped the balance wheel during reassembly...😔. Unfortunately they are quite expensive to get so for now I'll won't do anything with it but I would like to fix it at one point. The timemaster is still running (yeah!) but I managed to break a dial foot during the deassembly. First repair attempt failed so now I am looking at soldering it back on... So there we go. My initial foray into this great hobby. Thanks for sticking with this tale so far.  I'm hoping that once the balance wheel arrives for the citizen I will be able to say I bought a non runner and fixed it! So fingers crossed. Thanks for looking, Nick
×
×
  • Create New...