The Breitling Watch Source Forums

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Jerome

Learned the hard way today that I should have bought another tool..........

A mainspring winder - damn those things are hard to get back in the barrel!

Well, I thought I'd give you an update today - I learned a lot this weekend.

I had stripped down a Tavannes (Swiss) 7 jewel pocket watch - 16 size I think (maybe 17). I had no problem stripping it down and cleaned all the parts and I spent about 4 hours today reassembling. Some things went fine, some not so well, but got to the point where the balance was the only thing left.

I had some problems getting it set between the jewels - could get one in, but not the other. Then I realised that I hadn't got the fine adjustment on the balance spring, so out it came again. I had a real hard time trying to get the balance speing over the fine adjuster and then managed to break the balance spring away from the pin that holds the spring onto the balance cock.

Other than that everything seems OK, but now I need to get a new balance / balance spring - oh well, it's good practice and it's an excuse to figure out how to use the Bestfit catalogues properly.

Looks like you are making some very impressive progress there Roff, good on ya!

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Certified watch nut.

I can see this being a very rewarding pastime, Roff.

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Driver8

Site Moderator

Yeah, the time went real quick, and I don't even mind the broken piece. It was a little disappointing not to be able to fire it up and see whether I had taken a dead watch and breathed life into it, but a replacement balance is cheap and it was an educational few hours. Above all I now have a bit more confidence that I can take a watch apart and put it back together without too many bits left over