Today - on my birthday - I've made myself a birthday present.
A... watch. An old pocket watch, to be more (but still not very) specific.
The story is simple. I found this watch on an polish website listing.
Added to watchlist and started thinking...
Here this still has a very nothing-special look, but inside...
Look at THIS!
This, my Friends, according to my best knowledge is a Glashutte.
And a very early one - made about 1860.
Glashutte balance wheel with Glashutte system roller (will show when I get to work on it), Glashutte steel and brass (distinctive) pallet fork and recorded shape (see Typ 1.5.1 in the link below):
Looks like I got myself a 4 digit Glashutte and I'm 99% sure about that.
The watch is in not-bad condition, with a totally screwed up hairspring repair...
It should be easy to restore it.
And even better... I paid $75. Yes, seventy five American dollars. I was so certain there will be some sort of fight at the end of the listing, but there was none...
OK - I could not resist
I decided to attend to the most important damage straightaway
Below you can see an early Glashutte pallet fork:
It's bent, so I straightened it:
As you can see, there is no big idea in making a bi-metallic fork. It's just that brass is easier to work on.
This is prone to damage, but also east to repair. ust be gentle and it will nicely bend back for you.
The balance:
It has a Glashuette system roller, mounted in the balance arm. Double roller escapement this is...
The most dangerous and stressful part of the job was to straighten the top balance pivot. It was badly bent, stopping the balance dial up.
It worked fine once again, but that's always risky...
This hairspring is already straightened, believe it or not...
It was so very badly bent, that getting a nice, decent shape is out of the question.
Still...
The watch restarted !!!
Not very decent amplitude, but it's working again!!!
This might not be Miss Hairspring America, but still I'm very happy with it !
P.S.
There is a 7 stamped on the underside of the balance cock, so I believe the movement number is 2207.
You humble me
In fact I'm not a pro and I don't like to work on not mine watches (once I did and imagine my raging fury when I lost a gear for good - it was not worth it ).
Anyway, POland is a liyttle far away and I bet there is someone in USA who does it very well. Check out on NAWCC message board, surely repairing or replacing a hairspring is a routine job for true watchmaker
Sorry for the quality, but that's the best I could get with just my two hands and a phone.
You'll see the hairspring is still not too good, but the watch does work and - with deradful positional deviations - it has reasonable rate.
And another interesting detail in this subject - the watch has H.R.Kommrusch engraved on the cuvette and here's what I found in a newspaper from 1867 (available online, of course).
'In Bydgoszcz - gold ancre hunting case watches, with and without repetition, ancre remontoires, hunting and open face, with second hand for doctors' and other observations - watchmaker R.Kommrusch Fryderyka St. 36'
Interestingly, the watch arrived to my place from... Bydgoszcz [it is a city in northern Poland, at the time under German rule...]
I've disassembled and cleaned the watch.
What a ruin
Looks like someone liked to screw down the screws REALLY tight as the watch has numerous broken threads. That includes the hairspring stud - the thread just would not engage anymore on re-assembling and it turned out the screw had already been punched to make the thread wider before.
Another punch made it engage, byt the stud is loose in the cock anyway.
The pallet fork is still a tad bent, but that's a bend I'm not willing to correct.
Some pictures:
The barrel has a complete stopwork:
The escapement:
And under the dial:
There it's signed G&L 2207, confirming the S/N and the watche's originality!
The click spring turned out to be very strong and I was very much afraid of the possibility of breaking it.
So afraid I got 'paralyzed' with fear and the tweezer slipped causing a nasty scratch
I can't forgive myself - on SUCH watch!
In fact it's a shallow scratch (I used my blunt tweezers) and it's one of very many scratches there are on this poor movement, but still - I feel rather depressed about it. Even despite it's not visible from every angle...
The overall condtion remains poor. With bent fork and repaired balance this watch does not work any good and it would take a thorough rebuilt using skills of best Glashuette watchmakers to restore it's glory.
BUT - it's an original early Glashutte watch so I think I'll just remain very happy with what I have. I'm still in a small group of people lucky enough to have one of those!
Once again - I happen to have found a complete A.Lange Type IV number 2207 pocket watch - it still sound too good to be true !
The fork is very soft and the jewel short - perhaps the jewel did bend the fork indeed. I only don't know why would someone push the balance so hard that he bent the fork and the staff
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