Farewell to good friends

 

Week 13

This week we are going to say goodbye to Amer and Faris as they will be completing their time in school. Best of luck to them and congratulations!

They prospered under the care and guidance of Michael (far left) and Henrik (far right)

STUDENT HIGHLIGHTS

Workshop A+B

Students:
    Art, Daniel, David, Harold, Miguel, Nine
    Amer, Dunham, Faris, Ivan, Louis, Varun

This week Daniel remade a broken crownweel for a detent pocket watch, it was a bit more tricky than conventional wheels due to teeth hearing downwards as well as outwards. Still more finishing to do but fits snuggly in place. 

Left: The newly made wheel
Right: The original wheel

    This week Miguel made a new bushing for the 6498 pallet fork jewel

Here he is reaming the hole to 129 on the staking set.

Miguel also restored a set of old horia pushers.

Here Miguel is cleaning the rust off the screw, spring and the pin

Upper: Pusher after re-finishing
Lower: Tarnished pusher

The complete set re-finished and restored

    This week Harold, after disassembly of 6498 and the Elgin pocket watch, has lubed up, reassembled, and ensured both can properly function before doing the timing. In the process, Harold learned the peculiarities of watchmaking in the past, as reflected in the Elgin pocket watch.

    This week Ivan made more progress on his school watch design.

    This week Ivan also made a new cannon pinion for a Rolex movement.

The old cannon pinion (above) had cracked down the middle.

 

 

    This week Louis made his own gear cutters from scratch to make his escape wheel.

Here he is scrubbing off the scale from hardening.

The finished cutters and the accompanying arbor with eccentric screw mount.

Thank you for reading!
Hope to see you again next week!

Meeting old friends!

 

Week 12

This week we had a nice surprise when 2 of our alumni came to visit! Welcome back, Sif and Yi Ting!

Left to right:
Henrik, Sif, Michael, Svenja, Yi Ting

 

STUDENT HIGHLIGHTS

Workshop A + B

Students:
    Art, Daniel, David, Harold, Miguel, Nine
    Amer, Dunham, Faris, Ivan, Louis, Varun

    This week Amer and Faris took their final exam! Best of luck to them!

    This week, Daniel, David, and Miguel learned how to unpin the hairspring from the collet and the stud.

     This week Miguel and David were working on their hairspring exercises.

Here is David putting his hairspring onto the frequency vibrating tool.

Here is the berylium copper clock hairspring Miguel is trying to bend back to the correct concentricity.

   This week Miguel also made a new winding stem for his Heuer stopwatch.

Because it is a stopwatch, there is no pinion on the front.

 

    This week Daniel fit a modified mainspring into a pocket watch barrrel. He shortened the spring and punched-and-hand filed a square hole into the end of the spring to catch the hook of the barrel.

 

Here is the old mainspring, completely dead. It no longer fully unwinds to its original size.

    This week Art and Nine learned how to use the pantographe. Art used it to engrave his pallet fork holder design.

Art is tracing the outline of his frog design.

Close up of the machine cutting the cheeks of the frog.

The frog after engraving.

The finished pallet fork holder with the spring and handle.

Thank you for reading!

Hope to see you again next week! 

Hairspring Week!

 

Week 11

STUDENT HIGHLIGHTS

Workshop A & B

Students:
    Art, Daniel, David, Harold, Miguel, Nine
    Amer, Dunham, Faris, Ivan, Louis, Varun 

    This week, Daniel, David and Miguel learned how to manipulate hairsprings.

Here they are learning how to manipulate a clock hairspring to begin.

They also learned how to pin the hairspring to the collet, cut the hairspring, pin the hairspring to the stud, and attach it to the balance bridge.

They also learned how to regulate the hairspring to exactly 18,000 vibrations. This is done before studding up and cutting the hairspring.

 

    This week David worked on finishing his first practice hairspring.

Above is the original balance with ruined coils, below is the hairspring now after adjustment.

    This week Miguel is finishing the poising of his 6498 balance before he moves on to hairspring. He also made a plastic anvil for hairspring work. 

Here is the balance resting on the poising tool. It has a plastic box around it so that it wont be disturbed by dust or wind.

    This week Dunny made several pinion blanks for his school watch.

 

    This week Ivan is making prototype pieces of the click spring for his school watch.

Here is the Omega pocket watch assembled and cased up with no dial while waiting for final adjustments.

Thank you for reading!

Hope to see you again next week! 

Quiet Week

 

Week 10

STUDENT HIGHLIGHTS

Workshop A and B

Students:
    Art, Daniel, David, Harold, Miguel, Nine Amer, Dunham, Faris, Ivan, Louis, Varun

    This week Daniel, David and Miguel started the hairspring course. They started with removing the balance staff from the balance wheel and installing a new one.

Michael demonstrating how to remove the roller table on the Bergeon Platax.

Michael also showed them how to remove the roller table using the roller table removing tool.

After removing the roller table, the balance is clamped into the lathe and the balance staff is mostly turned off close to the hub of the balance wheel.

Using the staking set to punch out the remaining part of the balance staff.

Preparing to fit in a new balance staff on the staking set.

 

    Miguel prepared his staking punches before riveting. He refreshed the staking punches by grinding away the deep scratches with a diamond file and then polishing it.

2 Flat punches

2 Tapered punches

 

    This week Art and Nine learned how to use the milling attachment for the lathe. Afterwards, Art used it to make the locking screw for his graver holder.

Art made a hexagon shaped screw using the lathe's divisions.

 

 

Thank you for reading!

Hope to see you again next week!