Erratic timegrapher reading

[ekv81]

I recently completed a service on a Hamiltion 689 (ETA 2451). The timegrapher shows that the rate is erratic even when left in a single position, even worse when switching positions. I demagnetized the movement, cleaned and oiled jewel settings and cleaned the balance complete an additional time by soaking in Ronsonal lighter fluid for an hour. I don't see an issue with the hairspring.

Any idea what's wrong?

[nevenbekriev]

The distance between the outer coil and the rest of the spring is small and probably the spring touches the stud at big amplitude. The spring is just not centered well. The end of hte spring must be bent imediately after the stud in the direction of the longer arrow to improve the situation

[Nucejoe]

 If you can show a magnified close up of the regulator slot and top view of the coil, what neven says can be seen,  where to correct can be shown and is educational. 

Show these with the balance at rest.

Rgds

 

Edited December 12, 2023 by Nucejoe

[ekv81]

Thank you for the responses. I took some better images and I think nevenbekriev is correct. It does appear that the outer coil of the spring rests against the stud.

[Nucejoe]

 Lucky the coil looks undamaged, and yes outer coil too close to the stud and hits it, a bit of correction where neven drew a line is likely to correct the coil, yet non of above stops the watch.

Balance rim is too close to the   fork cock    might rub on it and that does stop the watch. Does it run in FU position?

 

Edited December 14, 2023 by Nucejoe

[JohnR725]

On 12/10/2023 at 6:02 PM, ekv81 said:

I recently completed a service on a Hamiltion 689 (ETA 2451). The timegrapher shows that the rate is erratic even when left in a single position, even worse when switching positions. I demagnetized the movement, cleaned and oiled jewel settings and cleaned the balance complete an additional time by soaking in Ronsonal lighter fluid for an hour. I don't see an issue with the hairspring.

by the definition of service you completely disassembled the entire watch cleaned everything and replace the mainspring? versus the other part of the quote of cleaned and oil jeweled settings clean the balance wheel etc. but did you clean the entire watch and what did you do with the mainspring?

in addition how did you lubricate the escapement?

Visually how does the amplitude compare with what you're seeing versus what the timing machine is showing? Then what does the watch look like on the timing machine 24 hours later?

 

[Nucejoe]

On 12/11/2023 at 5:32 AM, ekv81 said:

 cleaned the balance complete an additional time by soaking in Ronsonal lighter fluid for an hour. 

You do realize Ronson lighter fluid isn't shellac friendly.

 I take it mainspring is the old one, if so and your getting 258 amplitude, you must have lubed the pallets.

 

 

[nevenbekriev]

15 minutes ago, Nucejoe said:

You do realize Ronson lighter fluid isn't shellac friendly.

 

 

 

No shellak on the balance in such watches, so no danger. But, no use of such cleaning I guess.

[Nucejoe]

20 minutes ago, nevenbekriev said:

No shellak on the balance in such watches, so no danger. But, no use of such cleaning I guess.

Thanks for the info Neven , didn't know this so I 

Counting on my fingers, I figured 2451 must be old belonging to shellac era. 

Also , mistook your advice on this hairspring with  one in another thread for sorting hairspring, so again 

Rgds

Edited December 14, 2023 by Nucejoe

[RichardHarris123]

I've never had an issue with Ronsonol and shellac. 

[Neverenoughwatches]

On 12/12/2023 at 4:27 PM, nevenbekriev said:

The distance between the outer coil and the rest of the spring is small and probably the spring touches the stud at big amplitude. The spring is just not centered well. The end of hte spring must be bent imediately after the stud in the direction of the longer arrow to improve the situation

Nev, what the hell are you looking ? All i see is blurred mess

[nevenbekriev]

Well, it is not well focused, but with few clicks on the picture it gets big enough. But the next pictures confirm what I suspected.

[Neverenoughwatches]

4 minutes ago, nevenbekriev said:

Well, it is not well focused, but with few clicks on the picture it gets big enough. But the next pictures confirm what I suspected.

I tried that,the picture improved slightly. But well spotted.

[Nucejoe]

16 minutes ago, RichardHarris123 said:

I've never had an issue with Ronsonol and shellac. 

Test  Shellac + Ronson in Ultrasonic, then show us  if any shellac has remained.  

7 minutes ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

I tried that,the picture improved slightly. But well spotted.

  lol

 

I wouldn't be surprised if the outer coil jumps behind the stud when breathing at high amplitude.

Rgds

[RichardHarris123]

9 minutes ago, Nucejoe said:

Test  Shellac + Ronson in Ultrasonic, then show us  if any shellac has remained.  

Interesting, that's how I clean.  This is what someone with far more experience than me said. 

[Jon]

1 hour ago, nevenbekriev said:

No shellak on the balance in such watches, so no danger. But, no use of such cleaning I guess.

What holds the impulse jewel in place on the roller if there isn't any shellac?

[nevenbekriev]

8 minutes ago, Jon said:

What holds the impulse jewel in place on the roller if there isn't any shellac?

The jewel is press-fitted, just like the jewels in the plates. This is for all contemporary watches.

[JohnR725]

1 hour ago, RichardHarris123 said:

Interesting, that's how I clean.  This is what someone with far more experience than me said.

somewhere in this discussion group in more than one place we've discussed using lighter fluid. The problem with any of the lighter fluids are they have other stuff in there even in super tiny quantities that may not be what you really want a half when trying to clean a watch. So somewhere if we can ever find those of the discussions again basically it be better if you could just buy the pure Naphtha as that would be better.

But no matter what if you looked at this discussion group over time it's still a very popular cleaning product that almost everyone was using that had been enlightened on there could be better things.

On 12/10/2023 at 6:02 PM, ekv81 said:

and cleaned the balance complete an additional time by soaking in Ronsonal lighter fluid for an hour

now I did get to interpret that with the words and additional which implies that probably the entire watch was cleaned and lighter fluid. Without actually looking at the roller jewel to confirm 100% weather is pressed in or not what about the pallet stones? They would probably have shellac

 

[Nucejoe]

Notice OH doesn't speak of Ronson and shellac in ULTRASONIC.

Do your own experiment, run for 30 minutes a shellaced part in Ultarasonic usinig Ronson.

See for yourself that no shellac has remained, all washed away.

So @ekv81 did you clean fork and balance with Ronson in Ultrasonic?

 

Edited December 14, 2023 by Nucejoe

[JohnR725]

16 minutes ago, Nucejoe said:

Do your own experiment, run for 30 minutes a shellaced part in Ultarasonic usinig Ronson.

interesting experiment how about we take a commercial watch cleaning fluid such as L&R with ammonia which is what my favorite is. Rather than cleaning the recommended four minutes maybe five let's do your experiment in go 30 minutes in the ultrasonic. It even better if you could elevate the temperature although usually 30 minutes and ultrasonic depending upon the machine it will usually get warm anyway. So the ammonia which does a beautiful job of making things bright and shiny after a certain point of time which is way less than 30 minutes I actually did it at school in a machine at 10 minutes will frost all the brass parts. So a little cleaning is good a lot of cleaning can be bad even commercial fluids. But as of yet I don't think we got any answer back as to what exactly was done for cleaning in this watch?

19 minutes ago, Nucejoe said:

Ronson

oh and then there is the other little problem we would actually have to look at the material safety sheets for the particular lighter fluid because the additives vary. Like somebody once asked about charcoal fluid for starting charcoal fires like for barbecues and whatever that was it had all sorts of very undesirable stuff. I think people think that lighter fluid is pure and it's not it does have additives with additives varying per brand.

[Klassiker]

38 minutes ago, Nucejoe said:

run for 30 minutes a shellaced part in Ultarasonic

Why would I want to do that, when the parts are more than clean after five minutes?

[Nucejoe]

39 minutes ago, Klassiker said:

Why would I want to do that, when the parts are more than clean after five minutes?

We were talking about Ronson not being shellac friendly. 

Lets help fix OP watch, the subject was erratic tg reading.

Rgds

[ekv81]

13 hours ago, JohnR725 said:

by the definition of service you completely disassembled the entire watch cleaned everything and replace the mainspring? versus the other part of the quote of cleaned and oil jeweled settings clean the balance wheel etc. but did you clean the entire watch and what did you do with the mainspring?

in addition how did you lubricate the escapement?

Visually how does the amplitude compare with what you're seeing versus what the timing machine is showing? Then what does the watch look like on the timing machine 24 hours later?

 

I did disassemble the entire watch and used Ronsonol and an ultrasonic machine to clean everything. I replaced the mainspring with a new one. I lubricated the exit pallet stone and allowed the watch to run several rotations of the escape wheel then removed the pallet fork to clean it again. 

Visually the watch has good amplitude. The watch ran 1.5-2 minutes slow in all positions after 24 hours (I hadn't made any further adjustments) with lower amplitude and low beat error. Most of the variation is between horizontal and vertical.

9 hours ago, Nucejoe said:

You do realize Ronson lighter fluid isn't shellac friendly.

 I take it mainspring is the old one, if so and your getting 258 amplitude, you must have lubed the pallets.

 

 

I did not realize that. I already knew that IPA will dissolve shellac but had been led to believe that Ronson is safe to use.

I replaced the mainspring with a new one.

8 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

Nev, what the hell are you looking ? All i see is blurred mess

I was left impressed

6 hours ago, Nucejoe said:

Notice OH doesn't speak of Ronson and shellac in ULTRASONIC.

Do your own experiment, run for 30 minutes a shellaced part in Ultarasonic usinig Ronson.

See for yourself that no shellac has remained, all washed away.

So @ekv81 did you clean fork and balance with Ronson in Ultrasonic?

 

I installed the balance on the mainplate and cleaned it in the ultrasonic for around 4 minutes. I did not clean the pallet in ultrasonic, only soaked it.

 

[Nucejoe]

1 hour ago, ekv81 said:

I did not realize that. I already knew that IPA will dissolve shellac but had been led to believe that Ronson is safe use.

So check if any shellac is left on palletes, nevertheless, TG shows both pallete are firmly intact.

You are likely to see much improved tg graph once hairspring coil is centered which should move outer coil away from the stud.

Pegging always yields  better results.

Rgds

[Waggy]

11 hours ago, Nucejoe said:

Notice OH doesn't speak of Ronson and shellac in ULTRASONIC.

@Nucejoe I'm confused, are you saying that the danger to the shellac is from the Ronson (naphtha) or with the ultrasonic or both or....?

Edited December 15, 2023 by Waggy
grammar