Hairspring turning tool

[gary17]

Hi

I need to get a Hairspring turning tool. They seem to come in sizes. 

One end of the tool refits the Hairspring and they give you a size for the shaft size for this end. 

The other end let's you turn the spring collet and there seems to be no size for this end. 

What I need to know is which size should I get to get the most use from. 

Any help appreciated there not cheap to buy. 

Cheers

Gary

[Tmuir]

I'm not quite sure what tool you are talking about, but if you are working on hairsprings and you haven't already got yourself one find yourself a good condition second hand staking tool as you can use this to refit hairsprings.

Then to adjust the hairspring hang it on a balance tack

And finally make this tool for adjusting the hairspring.

Mine was made from blue steel approx 2.5mm in diameter.

I went a bit crazy with the grinding on mine, you really just need to grind / file about the last 15mm from the end take it off from both sides so its is about 0.3mm thick (this can be bigger or smaller depending on the hairspring collet size) and then file the end as shown in the photo so it looks a bit like a tiny hockey stick.

The idea is you have worked out already if you want to rotate the hairspring to the left or the right and then you hang it on the balance tack and hold the balance wheel. As the tool is only 0.3mm thick turning it on its side you can slide it between the hairspring coils and then turn it 90 degrees so the end of the 'hockey stick' is facing towards the slot in the collet and you push it in the slot which loosens the collet and you can rotate the hairspring and then the remove the tool.

It may help to put a little wedge into the very end of the tool so it goes into the slot on the collet easier.

I hope that all makes sense.

 

[nickelsilver]

I think only Bergeon has them, and they give no indication what the actual sizes are. In the pic, the foreground is two commercial one (old, I believe Bergeon but unmarked), you can see what the two ends look like. The other two are shop made and double ended just for turning; I needed an extra small one and a larger one with an extra fine "finger".

 

I don't know what they cost but I'd say just buy the 5 that Bergeon sells, if you just get one or two you'll always need one you don't have.

 

[gary17]

Cheers

Guys

[HectorLooi]

My mentor taught me to use an old oiler for this. Just use 1 big enough for the job. Wedge it in, give it a slight twist axially to open up the collet ever so slightly and turn collet to desired position.

It works. But I find that oilers tend to be a bit to flexible and getting the collet to zero beat error position a little difficult. Instead, I use a ground down sewing needle. I read it in a book by Henry Fried. Let me search for it and I'll post it later.

[HectorLooi]

Here is the page from the book.

[HectorLooi]

There was a tool on Ebay last week for adjusting the hairspring collet. I took a screen shot of it. I may make 1 to see if it actually works.