Bench Test & The Real Exam!

Bench Test & The Real Exam!

WEEK 34

Harman Wadhwa 

Origin : New Delhi, India

Age : 28

Watchmaking class : 8 month Service & Technician course

Current mood : Final exams AKA Stress Days. I am prepared and hoping for it to go well. 

It is a 3 day exam, 1 day of theory and 2 days of practical. I will be working on ETA Movt 7753 and 2892 finding out the parts and overhaul the movt perfectly. Hoping for  better weather and health this coming week. Wish me luck, I need it. 😄

Pierre Aubert

Origin : Toulouse, France

Age : 23

Watchmaking class : 2Y Fullskill Program

Current mood: Exam week! Spent most of my time preparing for my pivot gauges exam. I took two tests this week, which allowed me to fine tune some specifics in prep. for next week's final exam! I also prepared all the sequence of operations for the undersides of my school watch bridges. Look forward to finishing the sequences for the upper sides before the semester ends, if possible! Otherwise, it will be after Christmas! Have a great weekend and see you next week!

Markus McDonald 

Origin : Stockholm Sweden 

Age : 20

Watchmaking class: 2 years Fullskill Program

Current mood : This week consisted of me finishing off one final piece for the winding stem, the reasoning behind this is that the quality of every measurement be it the length or the consistency of the square is crucial to the functionality and longevity of said piece along with the winding stem I also focused on making my tools specially the base for the balance bridge support.

Alex

Origin : Kaohsiung, Taiwan 

Age : 26

Watchmaking : 2Y Fullskill Program

Current mood: It's been a good week except for the weather. Finally finished my tool. Only thing left is to fix the corners so they look sharper and do the finishing. Also a little bit excited for the trial exam next week. My first exam!!!

Exam Week!! (Harman)

                                                       Theory which i love, NOT.

                                   Extracting the broken pallet fork staff via Horia Tool.

                                      When you take screw tightness too seriously.😏

TOOL (ALEX)

HENRIK's WORDS:

So Harmans final exam started finally! He will continue on Monday and finish it on Tuesday, we all keep our fingers crossed! Pierre continued to do another 2 pivot gage practice exams, while Markus finished his winding stem square exercises and Alex finished his fancy balance support tool which looks amazing! We had a new taster course/bench test this week as well, Michael form Malaysia which was very nice too. have a great weekend to all and see you next week!

Alex inspecting a screw he black polished.

Friday fun!

Keep Calm, Its Exam Time! & Highlights from Restoration II

WEEK 33

Harman Wadhwa 

Origin : New Delhi, India

Age : 28

Watchmaking class : 8 month Service & Technician course

Current mood : 

Pierre Aubert

Origin : Toulouse, France

Age : 23

Watchmaking class : 2Y Fullskill Program

Current mood: I spent the week practicing pivot turning and burnishing in preparation for my first trial exam. I took it this morning and was pretty happy with the results for a first trial exam. I look forward to improving the pace for next week. The rest of my time was dedicated to some tools that I need to finish. No time for the school watch at the moment, it will surely come back soon! When it is the right time, I guess! We were also lucky to have some decent snow early in the week, which reminded me of my winters in Montreal! 😎 Have a great weekend everyone. 

Markus McDonald 

Origin : Stockholm Sweden 

Age : 20

Watchmaking class: 2 years Fullskill Program

Current mood : This week I continued my work on the winding stem squares finishing all 5 models however I had to redo models 4 and 3 as both of these models where under the dimension and required re doing as this is crucial in a winding stems quality.

Alex

Origin : Kaohsiung, Taiwan 

Age : 26

Watchmaking : 2Y Fullskill Program

Current mood: I continued with my tool. It's getting really close now. After that would be the filling exam. It's truly a time of fill and blood for me. At least the weather is extremely nice!!!

HENRIK's WORDS:

The students are doing great at the moment, but I can also feel everyone are getting more tired the closer we get to the holidays, intensive times indeed! Pierre and Harman are preparing for exams, Alex will soon start to prepare for his filing exam and Markus is going closer and closer to the winding stem exam. I have a feeling the end of this year will be very intensive. Last week we had no time to do a post as we all were far too busy! The students worked on independent projects and I was very busy teaching 5 watchmakers from all over the world a restoration class, which turned out to be not only very interesting but also very fun! we had two subjects; how to deal with gears and hairsprings in restoration, the students got to try out making an hour wheel, burnishing pivots of pinions, making experiments with gear train faults and measuring their impacts in the Witschi X1 timing machine to more deeply understand their impacts on amplitude, as well as trying out the topping tool, and calculating missing gears; what module cutter to order, how many teeth or leaves they should have and the full diameters. we also had time talking about hairsprings and how to source material, what to do if they are broken and practicing restoring bent hairsprings and some even got time to raise the double bends for Breguet hairsprings, very intensive but efficient course I felt, exhausting too :) I am still a bit tired to be perfectly honest! Oh! and as a topping on the cake, we even got time to make a quick visit to Mr. Simonin where the students could find the literature and tools they needed to grow their restoration careers. Below I share some highlights from the course, enjoy! and have a great weekend to all and see you next week!

Everyone busy!

Milling wheel teeth!

Trying out the topping tool!

Burnishing pivots of pinions!

Analyzing impact of worn barrel teeth!

Finishing the milled hour wheel!

Checking!

The restoration II team!

Handing out certificates!

Happy faces!

Inside the microscope while milling teeth!

Visit to Mr. Simonins store!

Drooling over tools!

What a brilliant week it was!!

"WINTER" IS HERE!

"WINTER" IS HERE

Week 31

Harman Wadhwa 

Origin : New Delhi, India

Age : 28

Watchmaking class : 8 month Service & Technician course

Current mood : My Hair spring exam result was good, now I am working on chronograph and side by side pushing my pending work. Hectic days ahead as my final exam is before the winter vacation. See you next week. :)

Pierre Aubert

Origin : Toulouse, France

Age : 23

Watchmaking class : 2Y Fullskill Program

Current mood: I finished the raw stocks for my pivot gauges and learned burnishing, a skill I need to practice a lot in order to deliver quality pivot gauges. Burnishing is really interesting and satisfying. Unlike other areas of watchmaking, theory is not of much help once you have the right set-up. Instead, practice and only practice is the key. I finally managed to get some decent results, and this was only achieved by fine tuning my reading of what was happening on the pivot as well as the minor differences "felt" during the burnishing process. It is a lot about reading and feeling what is happening. I look forward to practicing more and improving this beautiful and rare skill. 

Markus McDonald 

Origin : Stockholm Sweden 

Age : 20

Watchmaking class: 2 years Fullskill Program

Current mood : This week was focused on expanding and improving the techniques of the lathe, being split between techniques for both manual and machine. Although both techniques had similarities the manual technique was the most challenging to begin with as it required maintaining a straight file whilst holding the piece and filling simultaneously, however after several attempts I was able to get a hang of it and improve the finish and consistency greatly. The second approach which was the machine was more straight forward as after setting it up with the lathe and the guard the only focus was on the filling. 

in conclusion after much trail and error I was able to get a hang of it and improve tremendously on both techniques. 

Alex

Origin : Kaohsiung, Taiwan 

Age : 26

Watchmaking : 2Y Fullskill Program

Current mood: Nothing special happened to me. Been filling for 8 days straight now. No more, no more...

STEP 1: BURNISHING! (PIERRE)

STEP 2: INTRODUCTION TO BURNISHING! (Harman)

Burnishing of pivots

STEP 3: BALANCE WHEEL HOLDER (ALEX)

HENRIK's WORDS:

I can feel the winter is knocking on the door! This morning I even had some snow on my car, but nothing too fancy, I am actually looking forward to see some snow as it lightens up the day a bit, I have been busy with a lot of different work; got to show Pierre and Harman how to burnish pivots in the Jacot tool thats always very exciting! Alex continued with his balance support tool, its coming along very nicely! Markus is progressing well with learning to first hand file squares and also guided in the lathe so that he can later make the squares on the winding stems. I also started to prepare for the next upcoming restoration class which I think will be very exciting for the students as I have prepared some interesting examples for them to analyze regarding gear train problems as well as how to deal with old hairsprings in restoration, Oh! and I also got celebrated again by the team here for my BHI Felloship! And got some nice presents! its like the celebrations never ends :) I also forgot to mention; but last week I had a really nice visit of 5 watchmakers from Spain who where very passionate and may come in the future to take various short courses. Have a great weekend to all and see you next week!

Nice visitors from Spain!

The celebration continues, thank you everyone!

BHI Awards Day

Special Report

BHI, British Horological Institute Awards Day

As promised last week I bring some photos from my amazing experience at the BHI in Upton Hall England, If you would get the chance to visit, you will not regret it!

The purpose of my visit was to attend the award ceremony to receive the FBHI certificate, I was very honoured to say the least! this which was on Saturday but I also stayed for Sunday when they had open house, this was also very enjoyable with visits to the museum and workshops where some students and teachers were present to showcase their work.

The awards day on Saturday which was from 10:00 o’clock in the morning throughout the day with many various activities apexed at around 16:00-16:30 with the certificates handed over to the students as well as membership upgrades, which I was very fortunate to be part of! Also, this year it was full house and even additional seats had to be put in place.

Oh! And another thing, I stayed in a remarkable historical Hotel called Saracens Head nearby in Southwell, Nottinghamshire, this was an experience in itself which I can highly recommend!

Enjoy the photos below from the awards day as well as the open house day; 

Awards Day;

The hotel room!

We had some great speakers as well!

Alan Burtoft giving a great demonstration on shock absorber oiling

Very honored and proud to receive this amazing recognition!



Open House;

The Famous speaking clock

The actual lady that recorded the voice

3 pendulum clock!! Very advanced escapement!

                   

In the workshop

Nice milling machine!

Amazing movement model, hugh!! and running!!