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Old Swiss movements

Mr0ldschool

By Mr0ldschool
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Mr0ldschool Member

Mr0ldschool

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I have a pair of nearly identical Swiss movements from a company called LD Seine from Locle. Owing to the lack of any information to be found, I consider them members of the enormous body of generic Swiss watches. Since they are both key wind, key set, I'm inclined to think they date to somewhere in the vicinity of the 1860's, but I'm no expert. They actually both keep pretty good time, but I only have one good case between them. They do both have issues though. The first one I bought needs to be fully taken down and lubed. It will keep good time for a few hours then just stop. If you restart it, it may run for a few more hours or stop again pretty quickly depending on how it is feeling. If you listen while it is running, it sounds squeaky, so my impression is that it needs to be lubed.

The second one looks significantly cleaner to start with, having an almost gilt look to it, but after 6 or 7 turns to wind it, the mainspring slips and you have to start over. As such, you get maybe 8 or 9 hours and have to wind it again. No random stopping though.

 

I wanted to hit the easy button and just swap the barrel and its bridge dirctly from the first to the second, but the bridge has a locator pin in the wrong place and the screw holes are slightly different too. So then I thought perhaps I can move the barrel from the first bridge to the second. The problem I have at this point is that the barrel is held fast to the winding arbor and I can't see how to separate the two. I'm hoping someone here knows how they are held together and can point me in the right direction as to how to do this step. The last thing would be to try to find a replacement mainspring and try to do a better job anchoring it in the barrel, which I'm not totally against, but that still will require the arbor to come off. Any ideas? In all photos, the first one is on the right.

I hope somebody can show me what I'm missing.

 

Thanks!https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200921/e38ed9d86f2267bcf0f8184dc994460b.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200921/8444ea69bdc57835bc7835b6a98804e3.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200921/4445c2759bf108af1abe7a78a8fcbf0e.jpg

 

Sent from my LGUS992 using Tapatalk

 

 

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jdm Distinguished Member

jdm

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Posted (edited)
7 hours ago, Mr0ldschool said:

I hope somebody can show me what I'm missing.

I think that if you could post clear pictures for each of the issues you are having others would be in a much better position to offer help.

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Mr0ldschool Member

Mr0ldschool

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Here are the arbors on the bridge side. There had been a piece that covered the arbor wheel and was held down with four tiny screws. Removing it didn't have any change in the bond between the arbor and the barrel, and in fact only one movement still possessed it.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200922/9db4f75f8d7b32f0704d910279f1adce.jpg

Sent from my LGUS992 using Tapatalk

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JohnR725 Distinguished Member

JohnR725

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I'm guessing the problem is you're using Tapatalk Whatever the heck that is and instead of attaching pictures from your folder of your hard drive it's attaching links of where the folders of Image location. Occasionally because I feel like being a nice person and I wanted to see the pictures there down below. You might look into a different app that lets you actually attach pictures rather than links.

As far as swapping parts go because the age of the watches their almost custom-made's swapping parts really isn't the best approach.

Because of their age lubing would be nice but cleaning before you Lube would be better.

Then the word of the day for you to learn is suspended barrel.  that term sounds vaguely familiar? It's amazing what you do if you do a search of the messageboard there's probably more references but this one looked vaguely familiar like of seen it before?

https://www.watchrepairtalk.com/topic/14947-mainspring-barrel-not-secured-on-one-side/

mystery file three.jpg

mystery filed to.jpg

mystery file one.jpg

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Mr0ldschool Member

Mr0ldschool

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I post on numerous message boards with Tapatalk and it doesn't do that on anu other ones, so I'm disinclined to think that is the problem. I will have to dig into the settings to see if I can find an answer.
And to answer your question, no "suspended barrel" does not sound familiar. Thank you for pointing it out, but expecting me to know the terms I'm looking for before asking what they are is putting the cart before the horse. I'm just learning this new hobby.

Sent from my LGUS992 using Tapatalk

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Mr0ldschool Member

Mr0ldschool

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Looking at the other thread, it looks like what you're saying is that the winding arbor is threaded onto the inner arbor, and both sides do have square shapes which seem to support the notion.  Unfortunately I don't have anything small enough to safely grip the tiny inner arbor. I was able to get the mainspring to come out, however, by unseating it from the peg that it is held by on the arbor and then gently letting it out until it was fully unwound. It is a basic spiral mainspring.  The inside of the barrel only has pegs to hold both ends.  The other barrel seems like it has a t shaped peg or possibly a very short screw to hold the outside end.  I don't know if this means damage, or if it was designed this way.  I will upload some pictures shortly.  I'm working on transferring them from my phone to my computer...

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Mr0ldschool Member

Mr0ldschool

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In the first picture, I've circled the "peg". It has no ability to hold down the end of the spring, shown in picture 4, when it has a few turns on it.  It simply lifts off.

The second picture is a closeup of what looks to me like a tiny slotted screw holding down the other spring.

The barrel in the first picture also has two holes that I will show in subsequent pictures, which look like either previous mounting places, or potential ones.  I'm open to suggestions about the best way to proceed.  Does anyone sell the type of screw that would do this job?  Would an "S" type spring hold in place better by wanting to press outward against the barrel at the end?

Thank you all for taking the time to look at this.

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      By Neverenoughwatches · Posted

      The two measurements of particular importance wound be the height and the strength,  the length would obviously correspond with the increase/reduction of half mm of barrel diameter. There is a big difference in price considering that the more expensive one is the shortest. The longer one might be ok ? But then it is taking up more room in the barrel, might it effect the unwinding ? I wouldn't have thought so for just that small amount.  Ideally a pro might reduce the longer one to suit. But there is some information that might help, do you have the one that was fitted to measure up, though not necessarily the right one.
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