Accutron coils

[markr]

I normally just use a little rodico  and leave them alone but these are almost covered in oil.  What is a safe way to clean? I have a watchermaster  ultrasonic for parts and a regular ultrasonic for cases and bands also lighter fluid and onedip.

[HectorLooi]

Why is there even oil on the coils? 

I would use rodico to remove most of it, then give it a quick dip in lighter fluid and a blast of air to dry it.

[JohnR725]

15 hours ago, HectorLooi said:

quick dip in lighter fluid and a blast of air to dry it

At one time now banned of course Freon would've been really good. Used in the electronic industry and I don't think it would hurt anything it would definitely evaporate relatively quickly. Lighter fluid is probably harmless But I would not leave it in there very long just a quick dip to get the job done and hopefully will be okay. Then definitely do not wear use anything with ultrasonic bizarre stuff you do not want to do oriole damage something. Then getting replacement components for something like this is challenging to use one be careful not to damage anything.

[nickelsilver]

I'd swish them around in warm water with dish soap (Fairy Liquid if in Europe, Dawn in the U.S.), rinse well in clean water, quick dip in iso alcohol, pat dry and then dry with warm air. This is what the old electronics guys I know would do for circuit boards. Normally I wouldn't worry about the time in the alcohol, but Bulova was treading in new territory with the size of wire on these coils so I don't know what kind of lacquer they used on the wire and to coat the coils after winding.

[JohnR725]

7 hours ago, nickelsilver said:

I'd swish them around in warm water with dish soap (Fairy Liquid if in Europe, Dawn in the U.S.), rinse well in clean water, quick dip in iso alcohol, pat dry and then dry with warm air. This is what the old electronics guys I know would do for circuit boards.

We could pretend this is a Tektronix oscilloscope in which case you can run it through a dishwasher. I used to belong to the Tektronix users group and they were designed that you could Literally hose off the entire oscilloscope run the whole thing to the dishwasher run the boards through the dishwasher everything was meant to be washable in water with soap. The only catch here is were those coils designed to get wet?

Looks like I'm wrong? Checking both the 214 at 218 service manuals I snipped out the relevant sections. They're both identical you are supposed to use ultrasonic cleaning for the watch and you can clean the coils in your benzene cup. I have an aversion to benzene or even the phrase because one of those will kill you eventually and the other one probably won't. So today we probably don't have anything that's called benzene in our cup I would check whatever you're using though to make sure it doesn't attack the plastic and or the protective coating and I definitely wouldn't leave it in there very long.

 

 

 

[xyzzy]

IPA is common to used in the electronics industry to wash circuit boards today.  But this is mostly for cleaning off flux, not oil.  I think it would be fine to use, but IPA doesn't seem dissolve oil as well as naptha/lighter fluid/benzine does.  Those however are not typically used to wash circuit boards.