The wife and kids are off shopping, I'm on vacation and got nothing better to do with this afternoon than to play with my watches. So I decided to tackle a project movement and to get it to work again.

That's my little hoyy workplace and the movement is already in a movement holder so I can get to work on it right away.

After the dial is removed, there is nothing holding back the hour wheel (where the hour hand is attached to).

And as I will be working mainly on the bottom plate (basically with the top plate upside down), I need to remove the hour wheel so I don't loose it when I turn the movement around.

Now here is the movement in all its (well, not so much) glory. Very similar to the Unitas or Molnija pocket watch movements!

Very basic (non existant) surface finish and once I really know how to apply circular graining (perlage decoration), this will be my first project movement!

But before I can work on the movement, I need to release the tension of the mainspring. While turning the stem a little as if I would be winding, I move the click out of the way and than slowly release the stem again in the opposite direction while the mainspring now winds down. Don't ever foget this step if you don't want to risk missing or even broken parts in case the mainspring gets to unwind later!

Yep. Without the power coming from the mainspring, the watch stops ticking and the balance wheel stands still.

And after I have removed a single screw, I can remove the whole balance cock together with the hairspring and balance wheel!

Now the balance wheel is gone and you can see pallet lever, also known as the anchor.

This photo shows it even better. Well, two more screws...

...and I can remove the bridge.

Now you can see the whole gear train from the barrel and main wheel, over the center wheel, third and fourth wheel to the escapement wheel.

This photo shows how they interface even better!

Two more screws and the barrel bridge is gone...

Here it is. I even removed the click because I though that screw would hold it to the plate as well when it was a little hard to remove but I was wrong, the bridge just sat a little tight.

Looks almost "naked" now...

So off go the escapement wheel, fourth and third wheel and only the center wheel remains installed. This is the wheel that completes one full rotation every 60 minutes and thus drives the minute hand! The minute hand is attached on the other side on the cannon pinion and I need to remove that before I can remove the center wheel.

But first I'll remove the escapement lever (anchor).

Here's the cannon pinion smack in the middle. You can see how the keyless works interface with it so you can set the time. It is being held onto the pinion of the center wheel purely by friction and I can easily remove it...

..with my tweezers. Adjusting the friction is a really tricky job and something I haven't dared to try yet! Smiley

Now my bottom plate is almost empty, just the castle wheel and crown wheel of the keyless works are still visible. They come off once I remove the stem.

So many parts...I hope I can put them all back together later with no "leftovers"... Wink

Now I have cleaned the jewels in the plate and bridges and cleaned all the parts that I had removed and can start putting them back together and applying some oil as lubrication.

I am starting with the escapement lever, escapement wheel, fourth wheel (that's the one holding the sub-second hand in this movement)...

...third wheel and center wheel.

Here's how the geartrain interfaces...can you figure it out? Smiley

The barrel bridge is back in, so now comes the tricky part.

To fit the bridge, I have to get all of the pinions of the wheels to remain in their lower bearing (jewel) and fit them into the center opening of their respective jewel bearings on the top. A real exercise in patience requiring a calm and steady hand (maybe even some skill) Smiley

In order to check if I got it right and to see if the gear train moves smoothly without resistance, I removed the escapement lever again. After I wound whe watch just a little, the mainspring unwinds by moving all of the wheels real nicely. You can see how fast the escapement wheel is spinning in the picture, so I guess the cleanup and oil did help! Smiley

Now the escapement lever is back in place. Let's wind the mainspring a little and try something next.

If everything is allright, a very slight move by the tip of my tweezers should be sufficient to "click" it into the other position. And indeed, I must have assembled it right as the lever clicks back and forth nicely with just a gentle push.

I put the balance cock with the balance wheel back into position and immediately it starts swinging back and forth. This looks promising and the immediate heartbeat and ticking are a sign that the parts are now running freely again.

Next I'll put it on the watcvh timer to see how the movement is doing.

The beat is off (beat error 0.6ms) as you can also tell by the two separate lines on the display and the watch runs a little fast (+31s/day), but the amplitude looks good again! So I'll start adjusting the beat.

Looking better already!

Almost perfect. The rest will be adjusted once the movement is back in the watch.

I hope you enjoyed the little pictorial, I certainly had a blast getting the movement ticking again!

Cheers

Matt