over banking waltham traveller, fixed

[transporter]

Hi guys, I had a waltham traveller on the "bench" for a service/repair a couple of months ago, gave it a service etc and handed back, at the time it had over banked, I serviced cleaned movement and jewels, bench tested it for 48hrs and all was good. Anyway I got it back the other week again over banked,  well I checked the net for reasons for overbanking and had a good look at the balance jewels again, I saw some wear on the holes, so a dig through the spares box had a better set installed, but it looked like the staff was too short. The watch had been returned to me now minus the case crystal and the dial crystal!! Obviously dropped. So I thought snapped staff, but on measuring known staffs from working watches it came in ok, but still wouldn't engage in both jewels.

I had a look at the jewels and noticed that they weren't sitting flush, my bad I hadn't seated them properly ooooppps, but atleast I found that problem. I worked for about 3 hours trying different this to eliminate the excessive end shake on the balance staff, totally miffed I had a break. On returning to it I had a look at the balance bridge, I had by now become very efficient at unpicking and re pinning the hairspring, anyway on closer inspection I noticed that the balance cock wasn't looking right, it had an upward bend, only very slight but there it was, enough lift to allow the balance staff to come out the jewel allowing the roller table and impulse jewel to rotate out of the balance fork and then over bank. 

A small tweak and the balance cock is now running flat and true and balance staff now fully engaged with both jewels, I was looking for the fault before I found it and didn't even see it due to it being such a simple and un watch like fault. God knows what had happened to the watch in the time it was returned to the owner before being given back to me,, but im happy now to be giving it back tommorow in working order, +43 secs a day, I can live with that timing on a watch thats 100 years old. And now is resplendent looking with new crystals fitted aswell. 

So notes to us tinkerers, dont over think a problem looking for a solution.

 

[ricardopalamino]

Very Good Grasshopper . Good eye and a good fix . I know how it feels when you can find a fault and fix it .

[transporter]

Cheers mate, I hated it when it was returned to me displaying the same fault as before, but now I know it's running again properly

[thessler]

Thanks for sharing that, it helps us newbies learn.