Escapement

The movement on Ted's Adamantine is a fairly standard, turn of the century, American varietal. And when you're disassembling one the first thing you do is clamp the mainsprings. The mainsprings are very powerful and the gremlins will see to it that I'm badly injured if these springs are not carefully constrained. Dem gremlins are known for their dia-bo-lickal sa-ba-tay-jee. I have a couple clamps made just for this job. That spring on the right is about half wound. It actually needs to be tightened so I can slip the clamp on. I have what is a called a let-down tool which can both wind and release a mainspring. And here are the two springs clamped. And now the movement can be safely disassembled. The Falling Hare I don't know how aspiring clockmakers of old were able to track all the steps of their work.  Strike that. I do know.  Endless documentation, notes and drawings. Thankfully I can snap endless pictures. Now starting on the rear plate.  I need to remove the crutc...

Steve brought by a family heirloom pocket watch.  It is a Waltham 0s, hunter style pocket watch. It is a beauty.  0s is one of the smaller  standard pocket watch sizes , roughly the diameter of a 50 cent piece. Here it is next to the Elgin 18s . Hunter styled watches have two distinct features.  Most notable is that they are effectively double-cased with a hinged metal lid/cover over the front crystal and a similar one over the movement cover on the back. Think like a standard, pocket watch wrapped in an additional clam shell.  Here's the back case lid that snaps over the movement cover. Why does the back need 2 covers you might ask. That first cover is called a cuvette and in the days when watches were wound with a key the cuvette would have a hole for the key, protecting the rest of the watch from dust/damage but enabling easy winding. Here is a watch cuvette with a winding hole from a recent acquisition that I have yet to write about. So a non-winding-hole cu...

Recently Ted dropped off a clock from his grand father mother, Nana. I had previously offered to take a look at it for him. I'm so glad he bought it by. It's a handsome Seth Thomas Adamantine.  Spitballing, I'd say it's a turn of the century example. Seth Thomas was a major clock maker . They produced hundreds of models of clocks and manufactured many millions of of them.  A few years back I posted about a Seth Thomas tambour model that I acquired in Carmel Valley Village. The dial and label underneath our Adamantine's gilded plate is in remarkably good condition. Looks all original to me. Here's one of my favorite features. The lions heads on each side. Happily it all appears to be in fine shape and all original. Oh and its label is 90% intact. As you can see from the patent information Adamantine clocks became popular in the late 19th century. Seth Thomas started making them in 1892. Let's take a look inside. Removing that back panel we see the movement ...

I did not realize how kind the fates would be to me when I bought two pocket watches to use for practice in my class.  Got them as a pair, cheap on eBay. The Waltham 12s was the victim  subject of my school efforts and I'm glad I could bring it to life but, as I mentioned in an earlier post, with that purchase I also ended up with an early, unexpectedly  well-regarded and fascinating other timepiece, the Elgin 18s B.W. Raymond model manufactured in 1889 .  Turns out that Dave the Master was correct. This is considered to be one of the best made watches of its era and considered railroad grade before there was an official standard 4 years later.   Elgin the company was formed in 1864 and they started producing watches in 1867. They became the largest producers of watches in the United States. In fact the B.W. Raymond was the very first model that Elgin made and they were top of the line for many years. It was named after one of the company's founders, board memb...