This post isn’t about regular service however, it is about when things break. If your car gets a flat tire you stop and change it so you don’t have to buy a new rim. If it makes a terrible noise you get to the mechanic as soon as possible so it doesn’t do further damage. Well, with your watch it is the same. If you feel a grinding that is different when you wind the watch, have your watchmaker check it out. If your crown comes out, take it to your watchmaker, don’t try and put it back in your self.

The following photos come from a single watch:

Setting Wheel Post Damage - too common in this caliber

The setting wheel post on this caliber is known to wear. If caught soon enough the post can be turned down and a bronze sleeve installed to reduce the likelihood of further wear. In this case the post is worn too far to fit a bushing. I think it is possible (although I can’t confirm it) that incorrect service may have exacerbated the problem in this case. As the post wore the setting wheel was able to shift which would have made setting the watch more difficult.

Collateral Damage

As you can see from the “collateral damage” that it got so difficult that it broke several teeth off of one of the setting wheels and half of the teeth off of the sliding pinion, but that wasn’t enough. With all of those components all jammed up the stem pilot broke off and then the stem broke off at the threads. This allowed the crown to come out from the case.

Damage from trying to re-insert a broken stem.

When the crown came off in the watch owner’s hands he clearly made several attempts to screw it back in to the watch based by the number of circles carved into the mainplate around the hole for the stem.

The morale of the story is, when something in your watch just doesn’t feel right. Go visit your watchmaker and you could prevent several hundred dollars worth of damage.

Inside the watch has the A. Schild Caliber 1702/1 with 25 jewels and . . .

This driving wheel for the barrel with 16 ruby jewels. Not one of these jewels even protrudes from the wheel far enough to contact anything. Completely useless! Now that’s quality!

The thing is, it really is a decent watch, even with only 25 useful jewels. They should have just labeled it 25 jewels.

I first learned about Andrew Baron a few weeks ago when I learned about his presentation for the Midwest Watch and Clockmakers Association which will be this Friday and Saturday May 4th and 5th. (Having seen a preview of this presentation, I would definitely attend both events if you live anywhere even remotely close. It would be worth a couple hours of driving easily.)

(You all narrowly missed a shameless plea for donations when I learned about this presentation because I really wanted to fly out and see it. — That is until I learned that Andrew Baron lives near me and I arranged a meeting.)

Andrew Baron is a paper engineer (he designs pop-up books) who has spent his life restoring all things mechanical and electrical. Recently he worked with the Franklin Institute to restore the Maillardet Automaton, the draftsman writer, featured on my blog a few months ago. You can learn about how he got involved in this project on his web page, Andy & the Automaton.

As a side note, before I get into my wonderful weekend I would suggest reading The Invention of Hugo Cabret and viewing the movie Hugo (Two-disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + Digital Copy).You might even be interested in The Hugo Movie Companion: A Behind the Scenes Look at How a Beloved Book Became a Major Motion Picture.

Okay, so at this point I’ll assume you’ve clicked on a few of the links above and that you are familiar with the back story.

Andrew Baron, myself & others after the presentation as we wait for the Theremin to warm up.

I’ve been talking about making an Automaton for quite some time and my children have been anxious to see some results. They don’t seem to understand that this will take me months, or even years. On Sunday to help appease them, we built a simple butterfly automaton out of Legos.

In my workshop, and in my sketchbook, I have begun work on a design for a more complicated butterfly automaton which will be my first creation. I imagine it as an enamel and precious metal life size butterfly like the ones I encountered in the jungle of Peru.

Morpho sp, Photo : Bresson Thomas

Somebody must have torqued that crown really hard to break the mainplate! Oh, well, I will fix it. The black line shows the axis on which the setting wheel post should lie. The red line shows the axis on which it does lie. The circle emphasizes the point where the break occurred.

All the customer knew was that the watch would not wind or set. Well, of course not with gears tilted at funny angles and a stem that will wobble excessively these functions are not going to work as intended.

Recently, I had a client who needed a new 44mm crystal for his watch. None of the suppliers I contacted had one available – in either mineral or sapphire crystal. The largest was 42mm. It is possible to get a mineral crystal cut to size for a somewhat reasonable price, but the cost of cutting a sapphire crystal to that size quickly runs up into the hundreds of dollars.

The cost of obtaining a sapphire crystal at that scale – even before cutting – ruled it out as a replacement. Mineral crystal, on the other hand, wasn’t ideal as it scratches relatively easily compared to sapphire. Straight glass is even less scratch resistant and is more prone to breakage. Plastic would better be able to stand up to a hard knock, but it is very easy to scratch. This unusual circumstance called for an unusual solution and, thanks to a breakthrough material resurrected by the smartphone industry, we were able to deliver.

The solution came in a material known as Gorilla Glass. Developed by Corning in the 1960s, the new material failed to find its way into any viable product at the time and production was soon sidelined by the company. Fast forward 50 years and a viable market has since appeared in the form of the iPhone and, later, the iPad along with nearly every other touch tablet and smartphone that has debuted since. Steve Jobs’ biographer, Walter Isaacson, details much of the previously untold backstory around the rebirth of Gorilla Glass in the official biography of Jobs that was released a few months ago. Having just finished reading the biography myself the same week that the need for this oversize crystal arose, the unique properties and relative affordability of Gorilla Glass were still fresh on my mind and, with a few phone calls, we were able to make it happen. Gorilla Glass is comparable in strength and scratch resistance to sapphire, but boasts the ductility and impact resistance of plastic. It’s a truly remarkable material and, in this case, proved to be a truly remarkable solution.

To learn more about Gorilla Glass, check out this video on YouTube or hop on over to the official Gorilla Glass website for a full listing of characteristics.

I recently received this beautiful screwdriver sharpener from a fine gentleman named John at VersaLab. This company isn’t known for their watchmaking tools but they have done a great job on this one.

Before examining the tool, we’ll discuss screwdrivers for a minute, as we have in the past. Well shaped screwdriver blades are essential to the watchmaker. A well shaped tip greatly reduces the likelihood of the blade slipping and damaging the watch. A correctly prepared blade has two sides which are parallel which will contact the top of the screw slot and the blade will reach almost to the bottom of the slot without touching it.

There are 2 main ways to prepare screwdriver blades. One method is to have concave cuts on either side of the blade so that the tip is essentially parallel. The second way is to have two flat angled sides that come to a near point. Variations are possible with both methods so that the grain of the cut is parallel to the length of the blade or parallel to the tip of the blade. I know watchmakers who swear by all of the above methods. I have always used screwdrivers with flat sides cut with the grain parallel to the length of the blade. One interesting item is that the reasons given for both directions of grain are the same, (supposedly it provides better grip).

Some people prepare their screwdriver tips with a file, others with a stone, some use a grinding tool (necessary for concave tips) or a simple rolling tool. I’ve always just used a small stone to sharpen my screwdriver blades, but it has its downsides. Using a stone requires the watchmaker to have the fine motor skills (as they should have anyway) to keep the blade flat and to align the two sides parallel. It can be easy to get slightly off and end up with a wedge shaped screwdriver. I have found the concave grinders to be clunky and cumbersome. The rolling sharpener is easy to use but it requires a large stone and you have to remove the screwdriver and re-align it to sharpen the other side (this presents the potential for not having two parallel sides.

The sharpener from versalab is very easy to use and guarantees two parallel sides. Because of the way the carrier is designed once the screwdriver is fastened in place all you have to do is flip it over to sharpen the other side. The carrier will accommodate the full range of watchmaker’s screwdrivers with shaft diameters up to 5 millimeters. This is sufficient for Bergeon screwdrivers (with and without the ergonomic grip) from 0.5mm blade diameter up to 2.5mm blade diameter. I did not have the 3.0mm blade diameter to try but that largest size may not fit.

The sharpener comes with a high quality Norton sharpening stone which can be set to different angles by loosening the set screws on the side and adjusting the vertical support screw. At first I received a medium grit stone which was too coarse for this job. Be sure you order it with a fine stone if you decide to get this tool, it made using the tool an almost thoughtless endeavor. The tool works so well with the fine stone that it has earned a place on my secondary bench for sharpening screwdrivers whenever I need to. If you keep the tool accessible it takes less than 30 seconds to install the screwdriver and sharpen both sides of the blade. It surely, is the best screwdriver sharpener on the market for flat blades.

Versalab does not have their watchmaking tools on their web page yet, but they are available for order. To order the tool visit versalab.com and follow the instructions on the Contact Us portion of their page. The price is $245 with one stone + $9.50 standard shipping Fedex Ground in continental U.S.

Any of you who work on watches will instantly recognize this part and know what caliber it comes from. A spring clip holds the oscillating weight in place right in that little recess. I can surmise that this watch has been serviced at least 4 times in the past (assuming they scratched the bridge removing AND installing the clip.)

How long does it take to set down your tweezers and pick up a piece of peg wood or an acrylic stick to remove the spring clip? Just do it! It is an injustice and disservice to your customer to damage the bridge in this manner. Yes, your customer will never see it, unless I photograph it and put it up on my blog, but it is the responsible and professional way to do this. Please, take the time to do this the right way!

For more information on my views of AWCI and what I would like to do within the organization please feel free to check out this little page where I have put out some of my ideas. If you have ideas as well, please comment on that page, I would love to hear from you.

Before & After

The red handle on the following tool, from a different watch brand, is nearly identical in construction to the original handle on the tool from Tissot. In fact, the two tools are so similar in construction, I am convinced that both were likely manufactured by the same Swiss tooling company. This tool is one I haven’t improved the ergonomics of yet, so it offers an idea of what the “before” picture of the Tissot tool would have been had I taken one.

I applied two packages of orange Sugru over top of the red part of the handle, increasing its thickness, and then sculpted it to conform comfortably to my fingers when gripped. Here is the result:

I am really pleased with the way it worked out and now find the tool much more comfortable to use than it was previously.

Some Useful Tips

If you decide to use Sugru to improve the ergonomics of any of your own tools, here are a few tips I think are worth sharing based on my experience working with it:

1. Sugru comes in a specially sealed package and begins to cure as soon as you open it. I found it lost much of its plasticity within 30-40 minutes of opening it. So it’s important to have a good idea of what you’re aiming to sculpt with it before tearing a package open.
2. Although it cures to the touch within 24 hours or so, I’d recommend letting the Sugru set for 72 hours before applying heavy pressure in areas where the product is built up more than a millimeter or so. I used the tool to install some pushers a little over a day after forming the handle and noticed that it caused the Sugru in the thicker areas of the handle to deform somewhat from the way I had originally sculpted them.
3. Bits of Sugru will tend to stick to your fingers as you work it. To achieve the smooth finish I did on the handle, I routinely dipped my fingers in warm, soapy water as I shaped the final surface.
4. Sugru has an expiry date. Don’t order more than you think you’ll use over the course of a few months.

Link to Video, “The Lost art of Automota”

Anybody want to pay me a few hundred thousand dollars to figure out how to do this? Feel free to contact me or just make a really, really big donation and I’ll get to work right away.

First order of business is to take my family of 5 off to Philadelphia to visit the automata in the above video and then perhaps to Geneva where I know there are many more automota sitting in museums. After some first hand study I’ll sit down, design and make an automota. All I need is the big infusion of cash. Anybody?