861 Elgin balance staff

[jdm]

4 minutes ago, LittleWatchShop said:

Once I ordered a "balance complete" and got less than what I expected.  I still don't know what the term really means.

Everything down from the end stud, included.

[LittleWatchShop]

10 minutes ago, jdm said:

Everything down from the end stud, included.

So, neither the balance bridge, nor the associated jewels included.  I think that was the point of my confusion.  The ebay vendor said "balance complete" and I got the complete balance assembly up to the stud AND the bridge, but missing jewel.  In this case, the bridge was just a bonus.

[JohnR725]

20 minutes ago, LittleWatchShop said:

So, neither the balance bridge, nor the associated jewels included.  I think that was the point of my confusion.  The ebay vendor said "balance complete" and I got the complete balance assembly up to the stud AND the bridge, but missing jewel.  In this case, the bridge was just a bonus.

When people are scrapping watches terminology isn't exactly what it's supposed to be.

If the part is brand-new balance complete is the complete assembly of the balance wheel hairspring exactly what JDM said ready to go into the watch. Unless of course it's a vintage and then it's going to require some adjustments.

[Levine98]

1 hour ago, JohnR725 said:

The reason they don't mention it is because they don't know. In a world of absolutes most people just don't grasp the problem of American pocket watch parts. Even the people selling the parts have no idea.

The only people care about all of this are people were trying to repair things and pondering why things don't fit then take the time to study the material guides to find out what the problem is.

For instance Elgin if you ordered a dozen staffs at one time from them if you didn't specify a pivots size they would give you an assortment of pivots sizes. Which means of somebody is selling staffs out of the assortment unless they've checked the pivots size they have no idea what size they are.

That addition to the JDM suggestion above getting a watchmaker's lathe s another option for refinishing pivots. Also just a really good tool to have if you're working on vintage watches.

I'm just a beginner 

 

1 hour ago, JohnR725 said:

The reason they don't mention it is because they don't know. In a world of absolutes most people just don't grasp the problem of American pocket watch parts. Even the people selling the parts have no idea.

The only people care about all of this are people were trying to repair things and pondering why things don't fit then take the time to study the material guides to find out what the problem is.

For instance Elgin if you ordered a dozen staffs at one time from them if you didn't specify a pivots size they would give you an assortment of pivots sizes. Which means of somebody is selling staffs out of the assortment unless they've checked the pivots size they have no idea what size they are.

That addition to the JDM suggestion above getting a watchmaker's lathe s another option for refinishing pivots. Also just a really good tool to have if you're working on vintage watches.

The vendor in this case is a well known (to the vintage watch hobbyist market) supplier. I think he nows his stuff, but has a general attitude of you get what you ask for, nothing more nothing less. Like I said, my lesson learned that I've got to invest a lot me time researching this stuff before launching off into doing it. 

I'd love to invest in the Jacot tool, there are lots of them on eBay. Same with a lathe. But I'm spaced constrained and experience short at this point so these two items should probably be put on my list for next year.

Levine98 

[KarlvonKoln]

18 hours ago, jdm said:

You can do even better than that, budget permitting, get a watchmaker's micrometer (absolute best is Feintaster JFA, $$$), Jacot tool, bow and pivot file (again $$$). You will be able to shorten and resize pivots as needed, and will have surpassed many self-called watchmakers that can't fix anything without click-and-get parts. 

JDM beat me to it.  He is right about this.  I've made adjustments to staff pivots in my Jacot tool, and it has helped me quite a few times.  The most common repair problem with antique watches, pocket watches in particular, seems to be a broken balance staff.  My Jacot tool and burnishing files, and my staking set get used more often than I first thought back when I was starting out.

[Levine98]

1 hour ago, KarlvonKoln said:

JDM beat me to it.  He is right about this.  I've made adjustments to staff pivots in my Jacot tool, and it has helped me quite a few times.  The most common repair problem with antique watches, pocket watches in particular, seems to be a broken balance staff.  My Jacot tool and burnishing files, and my staking set get used more often than I first thought back when I was starting out.

Funny you should mention the staking set. I picked one up on eBay two weeks ago (a rather nice "Favorite" brand in very good shape, for a fair price from what I can tell) and have used it several times already.

[Levine98]

Well on balance this has been quite frustrating.

I got a 861 NS riveted to a balance wheel, but now cannot affix the double roller to the staff re: it looks like the roller shoulder on the staff is too small (it measures 0.60mm instead of what I believe should be 0.63 mm). So the double roller just drops to the roller seat on the hub. I tried to close the double roller hole but it is too hard and I don't think pounding on it is very good for the roller jewel.

Besides finding another 861 NS staff and starting over, any suggestions on how to use what I have?

 

Thanks

[JohnR725]

1 hour ago, Levine98 said:

(it measures 0.60mm instead of what I believe should be 0.63 mm).

According the specifications I'm looking at it's supposed to be .60 mm.  What did the old staff measure to be?

[Levine98]

great point. i have three old staffs (861 OS). They all measure .60mm taking the new style measurement again i get .058-.059.

More to the point, when I fit the double roller on the old staffs, there is a gap between the roller and the roller seat. When I fit it to the new staff, it definitely sits flat on the seat.

So I guess I have to chalk this up to a poorly manufactured staff (I don't know if it was NOS or someone's handy work).

[Levine98]

14 hours ago, JohnR725 said:

According the specifications I'm looking at it's supposed to be .60 mm.  What did the old staff measure to be?

See below. I could be misreading these however since I'm new at this. 

[JohnR725]

7 hours ago, Levine98 said:

See below. I could be misreading these however since I'm new at this. 

Actually what I was originally asking was what is the size of your original staff? What I was hoping for was the micrometer size of your original staff and the micrometer size of your replacement staff. This is why it's always importance to measure the old versus new to avoid having a staff in the watch that's now the wrong size or doesn't agree with the original staff

then is looking at the book that I normally look at and it's very clear the size is 0.60. But then I was looking in the Elgin material catalog and it gives two separate sizes. I look at another source and its 0.60 that seems to be very popular size. So typical with American pocket watch staffs there seems to be a confusion.

 

[Levine98]

First, thank you for all of your patience and help.

There is no question that the new style staff I received measures less than .60mm at the roller table on the balance staff. I am pretty confident it is new style since it measures about 5.30 in pivot to pivot plus the shape of the new style is distinct from what I can tell. So this balance staff is kaput (riveted to a balance wheel and no where to go).

I received another staff today from another supplier (Otto Frie). It appears to be old style (measures close to 5.17mm end to end) and has a roller shaft of .62. I went ahead and tried to rivet it to one of my salvage balance wheels and ...let's just say that this has been a frustrating day re: pretty sure the balance wheel hole is oversized from having the staffs extracted with a K&D device (I don't have a lathe). Bottom line is the shaft is riveted but not firmly.

So a lot of learning today, which is where I would expect to be given I've only been doing this for a month. It is of course very frustrated to learn all of this at the expense ($$) of materials, but I need to keep my expectations reasonable as this is complicated stuff and the source information is imperfect and very confusing.

Any thoughts on how to tighten the balance wheel holes (I'm assuming using rounded stakes, but I think I'll ask before I go punching the remaining balance wheels I have salvaged).

Again, thank you for your help. 

Jay (Levine98)