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Posted

No good deed goes unpunished. 

Some of you might remember that I recently helped a new member, @BigT, with a problem with a click spring from a 2414 by taking a photo of my newly acquired Slava watch.

s-l400-1.jpg.0814832c0a3828fa76f0642c28679b9f.jpg

Well, I finally got down to working on it today. I put it on my timegrapher and it was over 400s fast per day. Even when I moved the regulator all the way to the end of the hairspring.

I took off the balance and got a shock when I turned it over. There was epoxy all over the roller table.

20220821_174628.thumb.jpg.5fb9656b829054e98d9d2dad2861480c.jpg

I took off the hairspring and got a bigger shock. The hairspring appears to be glued to a crude collet. I know Russian watches are rough but I never remember any looking this bad.

20220821_180008.thumb.jpg.b810f7bcb0a3cdbb89afb925b1e76823.jpg

The hairspring is totally off centred. It's probably not original. I know that they are fighting a war back there ( the watch was bought from Ukraine ), but this is a real bummer.

Posted (edited)
10 hours ago, HectorLooi said:

No good deed goes unpunished. 

Some of you might remember that I recently helped a new member, @BigT, with a problem with a click spring from a 2414 by taking a photo of my newly acquired Slava watch.

s-l400-1.jpg.0814832c0a3828fa76f0642c28679b9f.jpg

Well, I finally got down to working on it today. I put it on my timegrapher and it was over 400s fast per day. Even when I moved the regulator all the way to the end of the hairspring.

I took off the balance and got a shock when I turned it over. There was epoxy all over the roller table.

20220821_174628.thumb.jpg.5fb9656b829054e98d9d2dad2861480c.jpg

I took off the hairspring and got a bigger shock. The hairspring appears to be glued to a crude collet. I know Russian watches are rough but I never remember any looking this bad.

20220821_180008.thumb.jpg.b810f7bcb0a3cdbb89afb925b1e76823.jpg

The hairspring is totally off centred. It's probably not original. I know that they are fighting a war back there ( the watch was bought from Ukraine ), but this is a real bummer.


"appears to be glued to a crude collet"....I guess that's what explains the epoxy. 😞

What are you going to do about that?  The hairspring seems over-strong (probably too thick) and was obviously bodged into place.  If the spring is too strong, you should be getting a huge supplementary arc with the pallet fork smashing its body into the Banking Pins and the Guard Pin, Horns (Overbank Arms) also smashing into their respective safety fixtures at each oscillation.  Definitely not good.

You didn't mention the amplitude in your original post...what was it?

BTW - I am getting into the 555 clock, but very slowly as I really don't feel like I know what I'm doing in there...

g.
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Edited by Gramham
duplication removed
Posted

The amplitude was about 200 only. A strong hairspring would give the opposite result of what you described. A strong mainspring would be the cause of overbanking.

The hairspring was probably harvested from another Russian watch with an overcoil design. There is evidence of 2 bends in the z-axis where an overcoil bend might be. 

I'll try straightening and centering the hairspring. But I'll probably source for a new balance complete. 

Posted
1 hour ago, HectorLooi said:

The amplitude was about 200 only. A strong hairspring would give the opposite result of what you described. A strong mainspring would be the cause of overbanking.

The hairspring was probably harvested from another Russian watch with an overcoil design. There is evidence of 2 bends in the z-axis where an overcoil bend might be. 

I'll try straightening and centering the hairspring. But I'll probably source for a new balance complete. 

Hello @HectorLooi,

Thanks for the clarification and setting me straight with respect to the hairspring situation.  Yes, I was relying on my reading of mainsprings when writing that particular post...very observant of you!  Wow, you really know your stuff!

Lucky me, and thanks for the correction. 🙂

OK, so I guess that a "strong" hairspring would result in lower amplitude?

At 200° the amplitude of your SLAVA is quite low, no? 

Shouldn't it be around 270° as stated by Watters (1999) on page 39?

"The amount that the balance turns is limited by the force of the impulse and the strength of the balance spring, but after the balance has been turned through something like 270°, the balance spring drives the balance back again and eventually the impulse pin strikes the opposite side of the notch; this unlocks the escape wheel to give the impulse again, and, once more the (opposite) side of the notch overtakes the impulse pin and gives impulse in the opposite direction".

So in your opinion is the hairspring too strong for this particular balance, or is something else contributing to the low amplitude like energy losses through the train or perhaps a weak mainspring?

Forgive me if I seem too inquisitive...I am just trying out my new knowledge to see if I really understand things, and it's pretty obvious that I still have a lot to learn and a long way to go until I have a working conceptual model of how timepieces function firmly embedded in my mind!

g.
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REFERENCES
Watters, Mick (1999) MECHANICAL and QUARTZ WATCH REPAIR,  London: The Crowood Press (ISBN: 1-86126-233-7)
https://bit.ly/3wnuYrT
 

Posted
3 hours ago, Gramham said:

So in your opinion is the hairspring too strong for this particular balance, or is something else contributing to the low amplitude like energy losses through the train or perhaps a weak mainspring?

It's to tell at the moment as the hairspring is not properly centred and the spring is all bunched up on one side.

I find it really strange that Cousins sells new hairspring collets but not hairsprings. I would have thought hairsprings would require replacements more than its collets.

Posted

20220822_235855.thumb.jpg.93dbae25c60df92e9f2938df43531f79.jpg

This is the side view of the hairspring. I suspect that this was previously an overcoil spring as the remnants of 2 bends are visible.

I'm not sure if the 2 bends can be  straightened out. I'll probably start looking for a donor hairspring. 

Posted
2 hours ago, HectorLooi said:

I suspect that this was previously an overcoil spring as the remnants of 2 bends are visible.

Do you think ? , and that someone would try to reuse an overcoil from something else in place of a flat h/s? . Somebody was very optimistic there Hector. But this IS watch repair and anything is possible . How about a section for worst bodge finds lol

Posted
9 hours ago, HectorLooi said:

20220822_235855.thumb.jpg.93dbae25c60df92e9f2938df43531f79.jpg

This is the side view of the hairspring. I suspect that this was previously an overcoil spring as the remnants of 2 bends are visible.

I'm not sure if the 2 bends can be  straightened out. I'll probably start looking for a donor hairspring. 

Does this one interest you?

I can pick it up for you and mail it over.

image.thumb.png.5d623c014f4d8ea8fb07df05c17e29c7.png
 

image.thumb.png.df3b20409871abac750f28a42297f300.png

 

g.

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  • Like 2
Posted
6 hours ago, Gramham said:

Does this one interest you?

I can pick it up for you and mail it over.

image.thumb.png.5d623c014f4d8ea8fb07df05c17e29c7.png
 

image.thumb.png.df3b20409871abac750f28a42297f300.png

 

g.

----
 

Thank you so much, Gramham. That's so generous of you but I have already bought a NOS one from my regular Russian watch parts supplier. He's from Ukraine and I hope everything is well with him.

  • Like 2

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