Jump to content

Recommended Posts

Posted

Hi if you can down load a copy of the bestfit books, there is an identification section where you can compare the setting lever spring with the pictures.  what size is the watch in mm as that narrows down the search criteria.

There used to be downloadable copies on the site put there by Old Hippy  Search the term  "mediafire" as that was what Old Hippy used to put them on site.

Posted
7 minutes ago, watchweasol said:

Hi if you can down load a copy of the bestfit books, there is an identification section where you can compare the setting lever spring with the pictures.  what size is the watch in mm as that narrows down the search criteria.

There used to be downloadable copies on the site put there by Old Hippy  Search the term  "mediafire" as that was what Old Hippy used to put them on site.

Many thanks!

Posted

you see on the dial side there is a number 150? Did notice next to the 150 it looks like a symbol but it also looks like glue on top of the symbol . Usually inside that symbol is a letter but I can't see it because of the picture and almost looks like glue. Then if somebody doesn't give you the secret location of a downloadable copy of the bestfit book I'll look it up for you but I need to know that and it be really nice to have the diameter measured on the dial side

  • Like 1
Posted
10 hours ago, JohnR725 said:

you see on the dial side there is a number 150? Did notice next to the 150 it looks like a symbol but it also looks like glue on top of the symbol . Usually inside that symbol is a letter but I can't see it because of the picture and almost looks like glue. Then if somebody doesn't give you the secret location of a downloadable copy of the bestfit book I'll look it up for you but I need to know that and it be really nice to have the diameter measured on the dial side

Hi. Thanks guys. Dia 23.68mm. The symbol has been machined out at some time unfortunately. Attached more images of another same movement but this one has even less info engraved on it. Any help appreciated. No luck with best fit download yet. 
Ta. B

BB19487F-C37C-42D8-9D5D-C41506D9C240.jpeg

D30B5000-8919-4117-A503-DE491397E543.jpeg

Posted
5 minutes ago, Boydie said:

Dia 23.68mm

I've attached a chart to look up  millimeters size and converted to something useful for the bestfit book.. llooks like 10 1/2l.

aanother way to find it is to go here and search for the number.. Or somewhere on the site  you can enter in size and various specifications and will give you a list but conveniently I don't know where that bookmark is clear on your own the find that.

http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&0&2uswk

looking in the bestfit book gave me a clue and the website has a picture

http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&0&2uswk&FHF_150_0

then I'm attaching an image snipped out of the bestfit book.  This is why wanted the size because he can't look at a picture until how big it is and searching through all of these is a pain.  Which is why typically I won't do it unless someone gives enough information..

24 minutes ago, Boydie said:

No luck with best fit download yet.

one of the reasons I'm deliberately not being helpful on this one is I purchased mine. So not sure who actually holds the copyright even though somebody will come along and tell you where to download eventually for free.

 

 

fingerprint 150.JPG

watch-ligne-size-chart.pdf

  • Like 1
Posted (edited)

I don't know who or what Orient Star is, but surely no Ebauche member, who used that coat of arms frame.
But FHF did, it is a FHF 150, John already found out.

fhf150.jpg.1ca53110f67da177e4057c4caa50b951.jpg

Frank

Edited by praezis
Posted (edited)
32 minutes ago, praezis said:

… it is a FHF 150, John already found out.

The bridge design of the FHF 150 is very different though!?

 

33E56BE6-EFBB-46FD-9CFD-3B783198AE50.jpeg

Edited by Kalanag
Posted
2 hours ago, Boydie said:

Hi. Thanks guys. Dia 23.68mm. The symbol has been machined out at some time unfortunately. Attached more images of another same movement but this one has even less info engraved on it. Any help appreciated. No luck with best fit download yet. 
Ta. B

BB19487F-C37C-42D8-9D5D-C41506D9C240.jpeg

D30B5000-8919-4117-A503-DE491397E543.jpeg

It is possible to pay for a download from the now registered owners, it used to be a tenner. WW helped me find it from old hippy's post, there was a couple of links to go through as i remember and  a password to open it once downloaded. I'm sure i wrote down the post link dates at home somewhere.

Posted
12 minutes ago, Kalanag said:

The bridge design of the FHF 150 is very different though!?

True.

fhf.jpg.7bb3fc1de7bf575050329c92094f6e8c.jpg

Maybe Boydie should offer his picture to Ranfft?

Frank

Posted

The password for the Bestfit books Old Hippy posted was tickandtock.   I have just checked and the references are still there   The search criteria is search everywhere so it loos through the posts for reference.

ie   Search       "mediafire"         verywhere (in the drop down menu)

Posted
7 hours ago, Kalanag said:

The bridge design of the FHF 150 is very different though!?

the fingerprint system identifies the watch by the setting components. Ideally you would have the physical bestfit book because the pages are printed to an exact size and the parts will lay on top of the book.

As someone else pointed out the bridge design has nothing to do with who made the watch. Lack should be quite common to have variations in bridge designs.

Then conceivably but I don't feel like looking it up it may be that both watches are actually the same would have to look up how the parts cross reference as to whether they cross reference.

Like for instance if somebody purchases OEM movement and re-brands it as their own and possibly changes stuff or possibly dozens then with the fingerprint system they may appear to be identical.

 

8 hours ago, Kalanag said:

this is where I purchased mine from which is why won't give you the link to where you can download it for free. It was my understanding that they have the copyright to it.  but it's still out there for free if you know where to look a just my understanding that they have the copyright.

Posted
22 hours ago, watchweasol said:

Hi if you can down load a copy of the bestfit books, there is an identification section where you can compare the setting lever spring with the pictures.  what size is the watch in mm as that narrows down the search criteria.

There used to be downloadable copies on the site put there by Old Hippy  Search the term  "mediafire" as that was what Old Hippy used to put them on site.

Many thanks!!!

4 hours ago, watchweasol said:

The password for the Bestfit books Old Hippy posted was tickandtock.   I have just checked and the references are still there   The search criteria is search everywhere so it loos through the posts for reference.

ie   Search       "mediafire"         verywhere (in the drop down menu)

Thanks WW!

8 minutes ago, JohnR725 said:

the fingerprint system identifies the watch by the setting components. Ideally you would have the physical bestfit book because the pages are printed to an exact size and the parts will lay on top of the book.

As someone else pointed out the bridge design has nothing to do with who made the watch. Lack should be quite common to have variations in bridge designs.

Then conceivably but I don't feel like looking it up it may be that both watches are actually the same would have to look up how the parts cross reference as to whether they cross reference.

Like for instance if somebody purchases OEM movement and re-brands it as their own and possibly changes stuff or possibly dozens then with the fingerprint system they may appear to be identical.

 

this is where I purchased mine from which is why won't give you the link to where you can download it for free. It was my understanding that they have the copyright to it.  but it's still out there for free if you know where to look a just my understanding that they have the copyright.

Many thanks John. Very useful, all of that info. Different bridge makes a lot of sense. Cheers!

Posted

The copyright is with William S Mcaw and available for purchase, copies of the bestfit books turn up on ebay,etsy and the like from time to time but are expensive.    I believe the downloads on the watchguy site are still getable  for free as is the ones Old Hippy put on this site( already mentioned)  the actual books are better as explained by John   but if find the page(s) you want just print them out and keep them handy.

Posted
23 minutes ago, watchweasol said:

I believe the downloads on the watchguy site are still getable  for free as is the ones Old Hippy put on this site( already mentioned) 

somewhere I thought I read it on his website that he was asked to remove the offending bestfit books because of copyright infringement. But

https://watchguy.co.uk/cgi-bin/files

so at the link above you can see you can download stuff like tech sheets and all sorts of nifty technical documentation like possibly a bestfit book.

scroll down to the miscellaneous technical and then in there is the word bestfit click on that

I always find this website a little strange in that when you click on whatever you want to download you basically go back to the homepage and the download link is at the very top of the page you'll see that it's actually appears to be two separate volumes but there it is and it's free

but there is a problem with the PDFs and that is their PDFs. They're wonderful if you have a general idea what's in there in the witschi looking for but ideally really went the physical blocks also. They want to pick up the physical books  from time to time and found through them because there is so much information here it basically becomes impossible remember everything in their. Job that means everything to pick up the book you'll discover new stuff but it's all very useful and helpful stuff.

then looking at the website where I purchased mine from $10 for something that's worth its weight practically in gold it's well worth it somebody's responsible for scanning it and having scanned documents it's a real pain so somebody did this they should be rewarded.

But here's something you can't download sort of and it's not $10 hits $100 basically that's the online version no pictures no PDFs of the book. But if you want to cross reference parts you can do that.

https://mccawcompany.com/product/bestfit-material-matsys-for-life/

 

 

 

 

  • Like 1

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recently Browsing

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Topics

  • Posts

    • Hi Watchrepairtalk, I have some questions about part sourcing I was hoping someone here might be able to help with. I'm working on an FHF 180 movement with a broken balance staff, broken regulator pins, and damaged cap jewels (both top and bottom). Some Googling says that this is similar to other FHF calibers like 150s, 160s, 180s and so on but I can't figure out what the functional difference is between these movements.  Is there any reason I wouldn't be able to acquire a donor FHF 150 or similar (with no shock protection) and use parts from that or would it be smarter to source replacements individually? Also are there any sources someone could recommend to get bulk cap jewels like this? Thank you for the help!
    • Hello and welcome to the WRT forum.
    • interesting video nice to see the machine what it can do now I wonder what it costs and I'm sure it's not in my budget. Plus the video brought up questions but the website below answers the questions? What was bothering me was the size of his machine 4 mm because I thought it was bigger than that? But then it occurred to me that maybe they had variations it looks like four, seven and 10. With the seven and 10 being the best because way more tool positions in way more rotating tools. Although I bet you all the rotating tools are probably separate cost https://www.tornos.com/en/content/swissnano   Then as we been talking about Sherline. Just so that everyone's aware of this they have another division their industrial division where you can buy bits and pieces. I have a link below that shows that just in case you don't want to have the entire machine you just need bits and pieces. https://www.sherline.com/product-category/industrial-products-division/   Let's see what we can do with the concept I explained up above and bits and pieces. For one thing you can make a really tiny gear very tiny like perhaps you're going to make a watch. Then another version the center part is not separate it is all machined from one piece. Then fills gear cutting machines have gone through multiple of evolutions. A lot of it based on what he wanted to make like he was going to make a watch unfortunately eyesight issues have prevented that. Another reason why you should start projects like this much sooner when your eyesight is really good or perhaps start on watches first and then move the clocks then local we have from the industrial division? Looks like two separate motors and heads. Then it's hard to see but this entire thing is built on top of a much larger milling machine as a larger milling machine gave a very solid platform to build everything.   Then like everything else that had multiple generations are versions the indexing went through of course variations like above is one version and the one below was the last version. Now the version below I mentioned that previously and somewhere in the beginning to discussion and somebody else had one in their picture. As it is a really nice precision indexing. Then I wasn't sure if I had a the watch photos here is his unfinished watch. No he wasn't going to make a simple watch like none of his clocks were simply either what would be the challenge and that.    
    • Use a Portwest Howie lab coat. They are the biological type so they have tapped cuffs so you don't end up getting the loose cuffs of normal lab coats catching everything. 
    • Some of the Chinese tools ae great and can be purchased at a fraction of the price of Swiss ones, some are complete garbage and some I'm convinced are coming out the same factory as the branded ones.
×
×
  • Create New...