K&H Watchmaking Competence Centre: January 2022

Friday, January 28, 2022

INTENSITY!

WEEK 147

Team A

Origin: Thailand & USA,

Name: A, Kate, David & Leilani

Watchmaking class: Technician

Current mood:

Finishing the week off strong with some assembly and disassembly practice on movements 6497/8 and 7001! This week we learned how to properly care for and maintain tools, as well as the cleaning and oiling process for Incablocs and setting mechanisms on movements. It has been a lot of hard work, but we have all been excited to start focusing on the components of a watch. Can’t wait to see what next week has in store for us!

-Leilani

Team B

Origin: Japan/Switzerland & Canada

Name: Tetsu & Dean

Watchmaking class: Fullskill

Current mood:

This week, (24-28 January) Dean & Tetsu had an opportunity to learn how to operate the Agathon grinding machine, which we mainly use to sharpen our gravers for the lathe, such as the Schaublin 70. Henrik demonstrated 10 different adjustment possibilities to play with, but once the set up is done, the actual work itself would be completed within a minute or two; another example illustrating the importance of preparation!Dean had a taste of the drilling machine for his plate while Tetsu tried to work on a lathe to gain more experience and improve their skills with help from Henrik and Michael.The rest of the time we continued sawing and filing by hand for whole days, which may be a kind of torture for some but we enjoy doing it.Nowadays, CNC machines can do almost anything, and those tasks we are performing would take a fraction of a second, but we are here to learn how to make everything without relying on computers.Our hands will be involved in every single step of watch and tool making and we hope that one day, we will properly understand the meaning of our assignments in the micro mechanics portion of the Fullskill program.We wish you all a great weekend!

Team C

Origin: Switzerland, Norway & USA

Name: Renato, David, Francesco, Åsmund & Robert

Watchmaking class: Fullskill

Current mood:

I started working on the pivot gauges. Made some nice brass driver plates on the jig borer and prepared the blued steel double cone base pieces. Started turning with carbide as well as high speed steel gravers. Both actually work fine. Also made some shims to reduce play in the 8mm T rest. Then we checked out an interesting Longines quartz movement. I tried using a polarizing filter on the mobile for watch photography. Works pretty nicely!

-Renato

Hello everyone,

This week has been going very fast, ive mostly been finishing up the jaws for the micrometer. Spent some time experimenting with different setup for the tempering to get a perfect blue colour. Both hardening and tempering went well, so I’ve spent the last two days doing the last finishes and black polishing. Will assemble it this weekend and take some more pictures of it assembled all together for next week blog post.

Meanwhile you can enjoy the picture of the jaws and screws 😊

Have a great weekend

Åsmund

STEP 1: MACHINING! (ÅSMUND)

Asmund finished his jaws and screws for his micrometer, stunning looking!!

Asmund finishing one of the screws for his micrometre jaws!

STEP 2: MACHINING! (ROBERT)

Robert was working on his pointed nose vice!

STEP 3: FULL HOUSE! (TECHNICIAN)

The technicians practiced a lot of hand skills especially assembly and disassembly exercises!

STEP 4: WATCHES! (RENATO)

The Ultra Quartz!

Checking if a signal can be found!

Yes its alive!!

With a new battery the movement did not run, but after cleaning the battery terminals it was running again!

He ordered a specially modified battery that would produce 1.35 volt instead of 1.55 volt that we most commonly use today in quartz watches.

He got very curious as to how a 1.55 volt battery can be converted down to 1.35 volt so he took it apart accidentally as he was modifying the plastic ring to fit inside the battery opening!

Unfortunately due to the unusual frequency we cant trust the rate readout. Massive consumption is probably the right reading though, 11.7µA compared to modern quartz that can be around 0.70-1.30µA, technology has come a long way!!

STEP 5: BOOKS! (ROBERT)

Nice book on loan from Robert!

STEP 6: HAND FILIING! (TETSU)

Tetsu checking the flatness and straightness of one of his very narrow brass filing exercises, it is here standing up on the short side, its difficult to see it as we are looking at the thin side!

Now its more clear! And very nice hand filed flat surface!

STEP 7: CARRIERS! (RENATO)

Renato made his own style lathe carriers for the pivot gauge turning!

STEP 8: TURNING BETWEEN CENTRES! (RENATO)

Renato also tried out to hand turn hardened and tempered steel between two dead centres in the Horia lathe!

STEP 9: PHOTOGRAPHY! (RENATO)

Renato wanted to find a way to have less glare on the watch crystal on his photos, the above photo he took with his phone.

He found a cheap solution by mounting a special lens that reduces glares over his phone lenses! Much better!

STEP 10: WATCHES! (RENATO)

Renato brought an interesting watch for show!

Special regulating system!

STEP 11: GRINDING GRAVERS! (TETSU & DEAN)

Tetsu learning how the Agathon grinding machine works to sharpen tungsten gravers!

STEP 12: STEAMING! (EVERYONE)

The students were working so hard this weak that the surroundings of the school warmed up so much that most of the snow melted and even the hill started to steam! ;)

HENRIK's WORDS:

Very fast week! And very busy! It was also really enjoyable! have a great weekend everyone!

Friday, January 21, 2022

MACHINING!

WEEK 146

Team A

Origin: Thailand & USA,

Name: A, Kate, David & Leilani

Watchmaking class: Technician

Current mood:

Hello everyone!

We (the 8 month technicians) are settling in nicely in this new town and have been doing a lot of sawing and filing to make tools that will be used during our course. This week we learned how to operate the Schaublin lathe. It has been really interesting to learn how to make screws and threaded holes with different methods, and I’m excited to see what more this course has in store for us!

Team B

Origin: Japan/Switzerland & Canada

Name: Tetsu & Dean

Watchmaking class: Fullskill

Current mood:

This week, (17-21 January) Tetsu and Dean worked on sawing and filing of the basic components of some of the tools they will be making by hand to be both graded as part of the Fullskill program. Additionally, Henrik provided a tutorial regarding the use of the Schaublin 70 watchmaking lathe. Fun fact: The “70” in the Schaublin 70’s name originates from the distance in millimetres between the lathe bed and the centre of the collet axis. During the tutorial, Henrik demonstrated how to tap threads on the interior of a drilled work piece and how to cut threads on the exterior of the same piece. As a bonus, Tetsu and Dean also had an impromptu trigonometry lesson related to calculating the cross-slide angle for cutting conical shapes; in this case, a balance bridge support. After the lathe lesson concluded, Tetsu and Dean continued working on making their tool components. Suffice to say that they have a very healthy appreciation of the work involved in filing brass to tolerances within +/- 0.05 millimetres!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Team C

Origin: Switzerland, Norway & USA

Name: Renato, David, Francesco, Åsmund & Robert

Watchmaking class: Fullskill

Current mood:

Hello everyone, this week me, Åsmund and Robert have been introduced to the 8 mm lathe. I’ve started turning some cylinders and cones. Then I calculated some dimensions for my school project and some technical stuff.

Åsmund started with his micrometer jaws in the milling machine, he has also done a bushing and two screws with the lathe for the jaws.

Renato finished the minute reset hammer for his pocket watch movement. Mainly turning the steady pins and press fitting them to the hammer.

-Francesco

STEP 1: MACHINING! (ROBERT)

Robert was doing some very interesting machining of tripod screws!

STEP 2: HAMMER! (RENATO)

After some adjustments Renato got his real steel hammer to work now and it only needs finishing! Nice!

Fitting the Steady pins!

Adjusting the steady pins!

Checking the fit of the steady pins before shortening them.

STEP 3: TURNING! (TETSU)

Tetsu trying out the basic use of the Schaublin 70 lathe!

STEP 4: TURNING! (DEAN)

Dean trying out the basic use of the Schaublin 70 lathe!

STEP 5: SCREWS! (FRANCESCO)

Francesco turning some screws for his tools!

STEP 6: HEAT TREATMENT! (FRANCESCO)

Francesco heat treating his screws!

STEP 7: DESIGNING! (ÅSMUND)

Åsmund designed some new jaws for one of his micrometers!

HENRIK's WORDS:

It seems everyone has settled in nicely in the school! The technicians and the new Fullskill students got introduced to basic machining such as drilling and tapping with a drill press, and also the basic use of the lathe, they tried out turning slender tapers, cylinders, drilling holes and tapping them, threading screws and parting off. Robert got very creative and designed and machined some very fancy screws for his polishing tripod, Renato was doing some final adjustments on his return to zero hammer and David did a few more winding stem practice exams aiming to do the real one next week. Asmund continued mainly with making a pair of new measuring jaws for his micrometre and Francesco did some designing for his school watch project. The week went by what felt like one day! It was also really enjoyable! have a great weekend everyone!

Friday, January 14, 2022

BACK TO WORK!

WEEK 145

We are back at work again! We also got some new students for the Fullskill and Technician course; Dean from Canada, David from the United States, A and Kate from Thailand, Leilani from The United States and Tetsuya from Japan/Switzerland. With the additional students Henrik also got assistance from Michael who Graduated last year. Even though we are now more people, the week went really smooth and everyone got settled in! Have a great weekend everyone!