Thursday, July 16, 2015

Summer holiday!

This week we had visitors from a high school in Hong Kong.  They are doing a special project on watchmaking and wanted to see how the school works and looks.
The students from Hong Kong with Henrik

We also had another taster course student who came from the United States of America.  She really enjoyed the course, and hopefully we'll see her soon.
Sophie disassembling a watch movement

Tomas and Theren finished their 2nd exam on the winding stem this week, right before summer holidays.  They are happy to finally have this one under their belts.
The students practicing making winding stems

Now they must clean the whole school before summer holidays!
We wish all our readers a fun-filled holiday!

Monday, July 6, 2015

Partying hard on slots

Tomas preparing the cones for the slots exercise 
This past week the students have been making endless slots practice for the winding stem exam.  Slots were made from blue steel thus harder to cut than softer steel.  The tolerance has been changed to +/- 0.01mm instead of the usual +/- 0.05mm and the students are still adapting to that.  Henrik has become much more strict with the quality of the work they produce (for their own good!).

Henrik showing the students how to thread steel
Theren threading steel
Henrik taught the students how to thread steel, which is also required for the winding stem production.  It is not a complicated procedure but requires a lot of technical knowledge and a lot of focus/concentration to achieve the best results.
Simone maintaining the 8mm lathe

Last weekend there was a music festival in Le Locle.  It was a 3 day event starting from Friday until Sunday.  Le Locle usually has a population of 10,000, but in these 3 days, the city accumulated  60,000 people (a whole lot more than we're used to).  The students enjoyed good food, good company, and of course good music.
Promo Festival with every person in Le Locle and more