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Emergency mainspring winder

HectorLooi
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HectorLooi Distinguished Member

HectorLooi

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20231004_100431.thumb.jpg.3029153c08083dfa64bc85ddb8b32476.jpg

What do you do when the correct size mainspring winder you have has an arbor that looks like this?

This is exactly the situation I encountered last night. I was servicing a Slava 2428, twin barrel movement. The barrel is so small that the only winder that could fit was a Watchcraft #2. But my arbor looks like it got chewed by a dog.

I remembered a post a couple of months ago about a homemade mainspring winder using a plastic sheet and a pinvise to hold the actual watch barrel arbor. Then it hit me. I could mount the barrel arbor into a pinvise and wind it directly into my winder. 

Initially when I tried it, the mainspring kept twisting and buckling and wouldn't wind nicely into the winder. I had the idea of cutting a washer to cap the open end of the winder. When I finished doing that, I looked at the washer and thought it looked a lot like the barrel cap. I took the barrel cap and realized that the barrel cap fits perfectly.

20231004_100402.thumb.jpg.09dc81c8e8e501260983e353dfa08214.jpg

So I mounted the spring and wound it into the winder easily.

20231004_145054.thumb.jpg.73ba2ff50948b3b562db9897ae5f8e1b.jpg

20231004_145923.thumb.jpg.13723cf5a0bc179fee71a8d96c412407.jpg

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      By JohnR725 · Posted

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