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Revisiting an old hobby


AndyHull

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4 hours ago, Tudor said:

Some Omega PloProf knock-offs perhaps? The splash of color would look cool I think.

I like that idea. I also discovered that EB8800 hands should fit the Ronda 1239-21 (the seconds may be a bit of a squeeze) so I might have some luck with that idea too.

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On 9/30/2020 at 9:28 PM, AndyHull said:

I've been wearing one of my recent 404 club watches quite a lot recently. The Sekonda on the left in this picture. 

 

Well I think it is about time for another status report on the poor tortured Sekonda that I lubricated with a mix of horse lineament and infant lubricant(*).

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Seventeen days in, and so far the wheels haven't fallen off the bus. In fact the experiment seems to be going surprisingly well. All of the other victims are also doing fine.

(*) Actually it is a 80%/20% mix of scent free hypoallergenic baby oil and finest saddlers neetsfoot oil, since these appear to be the principal ingredients in a certain well known commercial watch lubricant. As I previously suggested, this is probably not all that is in the genuine oil, nor do I advocate repeating this experiment, since there is no guarantee that I wont kill these fine pieces of Soviet engineering.

Edited by AndyHull
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I was at the art supply store recently (picking up a huge work mat and rolled paper sold for smearing pastels that works well for cleaning jewels n stuff for a lot less than “watch” supplies)

I saw purified linseed oil, purified almond oil, and others, used for preparing oil paints. And not terribly expensive. It got me thinking since I was about to drop a Hondo on teeny tiny vials of the finest oils extracted from the worlds deadliest snakes of Switzerland. 

SSO (Swiss Snake Oil) inbound...

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7 hours ago, KarlvonKoln said:

Interesting.  I'm following this thread. 

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I'm not sure how exciting a bunch of time grapher results are, but for the record, here are this mornings readings.
Dial up and dial down. The positional variation is not too bad in the other positions.

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From around -8 to +10 or so (possibly a little less if I actually give it a bit more time to settle).


The lowest amplitude is the 12 down position 255 degrees. Highest beat error is about 0.6  with 12 o'clock up and +10 s/d.

Not quite COSC, but not bad considering it has probably only been serviced once in its life, and that too by a lunatic with baby oil and saddle shine.

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Today's numbers are in (dial up and dial down shown), and things are still looking pretty good.

Over all, it appears to be about 3 seconds fast over the week. Bear in mind this doesn't mean the same as it being invariably accurate to less than a  second per day, as at different times of the day that number will drift up and down. Not by much though admittedly.

Edited by AndyHull
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image.thumb.png.c7b760f31f6236f9aff6d9b965cfa078.pngI confused myself with today's health check on the slippery Sekonda.


I was wondering .. why does it keep jumping about... then I realised the electric fan heater I had popped on to take the chill off the room was giving a loud click from the thermostat every so often, which the laptop was picking up and messing up the beat with.

When I switched off the heater, it went back to normal.  (facepalm)?

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So, it's great as long as you don't wear an electric heater on the same wrist.

I have some Snake Oil here I sell for use with tape decks and turntable main bearings. I've used it with good success on pocket watches but never tried it on a small movement...

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A quick update from the "horse lineament" oiling experiment.  First we have dial up before winding.

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Next is dial up after winding.

Its a little chilly this morning, and that may have resulted in marginally lower amplitude than it has shown after winding up until now. Previous days have all been around the 278 deg or 280 mark. 

I may check it again after it has been on my wrist for a while. 

None the less, it seems to be going strong and keeping consistent time.

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The other day I spotted a writing desk on Freegle which I thought might make a nice watch repair work bench.

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Touching up a few minor blemishes with a spot of acrylic colour.

I'm currently using an ugly old chipboard computer desk, so even of the Freegle item was not in perfect shape, it couldn't be any worse cosmetically at least, so I enquired and was offered it.

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A little baby oil was used to remove some sticky residue from Sellotape and other random stickers.

When we got there to take a look, there were some pretty obvious bodges holding the thing together and I was swithering about whether to leave it, but what the heck, it was free.

As they say, you should never look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth, so I popped in the back of the car and thanked the previous owner profusely for their generosity.

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Smith and Rodger wax finish applied to the wood restores the surface and closes up the worst of the dried up finish. 

A couple of days back, having sprayed it with copious amounts of antibacterial spray and further more, having left the thing out in the shed to "de-covid" I attacked it with a screwdriver, removed the bizarre array of ironmongery holding it together and took a good hard look at it. It seemed to be all there (although arguably, the same might not be true of me of course).

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The "leftovers".

Sitting on its polished top, "legs akimbo" as it were, on a couple of garden chair cushions to protect its finish, I dismantled all of its "undercarriage", and set too with sandpaper, chisels, wood-glue and clamps. I did resort to using one screw to glue and screw one of the spacer blocks, which had split corner to corner. The rest was restored with glue only, back to its original state (if you ignore all of the screw holes added by the previous owner).

The leather writing surface was removed and re-glued as it had come adrift. 

The only problem is, I've made such a good job of it, my wife has decided it will look very nice in the study. 

Oh well, back to the old computer desk, I guess. You know what they say, no good deed goes unpunished. ?

Edited by AndyHull
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The finished results. Way too nice for me to think of ruining it with clutter, tools, 3d printers, microscopes.. nasty solvents.. abrasives, paints.. you get the picture. ?

Smith and Rodger, for those of you unfamiliar with Glasgow, and who's wax polish, wire wool and wax wood repair touch up sticks I used.

They do a full range of French polish supplies, shellac, 0000 wire wool and so forth. 

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This is one of those little businesses that has been around forever (well 1877 to be more precise).

Its not a place you would stumble upon by accident, but well worth a visit (or a web order) if you are in need of anything related to old wooden items. Wooden clock cases or traditional furniture for example.

I have no affiliation with them, other than the fact that they are friendly and very helpful and extremely knowledgable. 

Edited by AndyHull
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Another 404 club member.

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This time a bit of a curious quartz number. Made in West Germany apparently, but I'm not sure who actually made it.

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It does have a few minor battle scars, and someone has lost the spring that makes contact between the buzzer and the PCB, so I need to figure out where that was fitted and replace it, so the alarm may or may not work at that point, but currently it is silent.

 

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8 hours ago, Tudor said:

I would say, at this point, we are merely looking at aging characteristics. 

I agree. Does it keep up this level of performance, or does it tail off after a few weeks or months?

I guess if I had been a little better organised, I could have done daily tests, and plotted the results, but so far, and with only a little over one months worth of fairly limited data, the results look consistent.

How this works out over the longer term will be interesting. I'll keep wearing the watch, maybe not every day, but regularly, for the next few months and lets see how it goes.

Edited by AndyHull
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Performance over the long haul is where synthetics shine. Less oxidation (drying out) and inherently more slippery than natural carbon chains. More consistent batch to batch as well.

I have some snake oil which I market for turntables and tape deck oiling, that performs exceptionally well there. I use it on pocket watches too. I have recently used it on a dial indicator mechanism that was acting up, which probably could have used 9010 in stead, but it is working better than ever now. That is unjeweled, which may be why.

But wrist watches, I stick with the usual suspects.

Did you see my post about finding pure linseed oil, almond oil (and other oils) at the art supply store? It is used for making oil based paints, but I know traditionally these types of oils were used for lubrication as well. Despite the art store mark-up, still much less than Mobius... They might be fun to play with as well.

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Some pictures of the Beta LCD watch that I posted in the 404 club thread. LCD modules are actually pretty easy to work with if you can use small screwdrivers, magnification and perhaps occasionally solder or conductive paint.

Generally there is not much you can do with faulty LCD modules other than clean everything. They rely on a 'black blob" to do all the clever stuff, and a quartz crystal to keep the time. The blob cannot be replaced, but sometimes the crystal can.

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In this particular case, I did do a little light surgery to the board, which had a corner cracked off it. The two pieces were re-united with a tiny drop of cyanoacrylate glue (superglue) and the track that was damaged in the breakage was repaired with conductive silver paint (available from the usual suspects via ebay).

Things to be aware of.

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1) The LCD is made of glass and is therefore very easily broken.

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2) The connection between the glass and the main circuit board relies on a thin strip of conductive "rubber".

This strip is actually a sandwich of alternating conductive and insulating silicone rubber polymers and is often referred to as a "Zebra strip". This strip can deform and expand, due to ingress of moisture or solvents.

You can, at a pinch, sometimes get away with shortening it by a couple of stripes, if it has swollen to the point where it is too long to fit in its original location.

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3) The conductive layer on the glass (indium tin oxide) can be carefully cleaned with lighter fluid or isopropanol, however take care with the solvents you use as they can affect the zebra strip and cause it to puff up. Clean the zebra strip by gently rubbing it with an ink rubber. If you absolutely must use a solvent on the zebra strip, use a very small amount. Lighter fluid is usually safe on the zebra strip, but your mileage may vary. 

4) The battery contacts often get covered with leaked battery juice. This is generally alkali, and you can attack this crud with a little bit of white vinegar on a cotton bud. This will neutralise the alkali but should be cleaned off with plain water and perhaps a little dish soap and allowed to dry completely before re-assembly.

There is a slight chance that the crud may contain mercury or cadmium, in which case, wear gloves when dealing with it and avoid breathing in the dust. Generally though, it is likely to have zinc, manganese or silver salts, which are still not a good idea to ingest, but far less of a worry.

Wash your hands afterwards.

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5) You can sometimes fabricate replacement battery contacts from copper strip, fine stainless steel wire, or thin brass stock, depending on the application. Note that it is almost impossible to reliably solder to stainless wire with lead free solder. 

6) There needs to be even pressure on the zebra strip to ensure that it makes good contact with the glass, but remember it is glass, so if you crank down too hard on things, the glass will simply break and your LCD module will be toast.

7) The front of the display contains a polarizing filter and the rear generally has a reflector, if you forget to fit either of these, then the display will not work.

8 ) Contact between the pushers and the module selects the various functions, so the case of the watch is often used as one of the parts of the circuit. Current flows from the battery through the case, then through the pusher to the contact on the side of the module. If any of this path is broken or dirty, then the buttons wont work, so make sure everything is shiny and clean, and that any contact spring between the watch module and the case is fitted, and makes good contact.

9) In older modules like this, the back light is a filament "grain of wheat" bulb rather than an LED, and when the battery starts to get a little weak, pressing the button for the light can sometimes crash the module, simply because the bulb draws too much current, and causes the voltage in the cell to drop, and thus the controller circuit to "brown out" and crash.

Here is a before and after shot. The before is from the ebay listing.

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.. and here it is after a little TLC

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There isn't much to put you off having a crack at repairing LCD watches. They are small certainly, but they are relatively simple to deal with if you follow the basics and clean and inspect everything carefully. Furthermore, this one only cost one penny at auction, so you can pick up a few bargain basement ones to practice with very easily.

Edited by AndyHull
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