Another Waltham military watch--observations...

LittleWatchShop · May 17, 2021

I am a little fascinated by these military watches. I started with one in the watch box...restaffed it, cleaned it (the old way) and got it running. I posted about it already. This is another one but a little older: Waltham 6/0 '42. It is comforting to work on the same/similar movements as I hone my abilities.

This one I cleaned the new way using my L&R machine and solutions. It is fun...and gratifying. The dial and hands are not on it yet as I monitor its running.

A few observations...

Look at all of those screws holding down the barrel bridge. Seems like a lot to me. Possible due to the many variations of the 6/0 perhaps?

The third wheel has its own bridge which is shared with the sweep second pinion. It is tucked in the "slot" of the barrel bridge and must be placed there before assembling the barrel bridge, fourth wheel, center wheel, and escape wheel. This must be done even though its upper pivot is dangling in the breeze. At first this seems like an odd thing, but I think that other variations of the 6/0 do not use a sweep second and the third wheel is either 1) combined with the others under the barrel bridge, or 2) the barrel bridge is split into two pieces where one piece covers the barrel and center wheel and maybe the third wheel, and the other bridge handles the fourth and escape wheels (I cannot recall for sure...I have one in the lab that I worked on awhile back).

I was surprised to see an open mainspring barrel. Had not seen that before on any watch I have touched recently. It was a little trickier to handle--maybe due to my inexperience.

Regarding mainsprings...I have trained myself to turn away from the watch bench BEFORE removing the spring from the barrel. That is so if the spring launches itself, it does not fly into my work on the watch bench!!

If I got some nomenclature wrong above, not not hesitate to correct me. I still have to grab FRIED to check names of things.