Mangled hairspring recovery--diving catch in the endzone!!

[LittleWatchShop]

Still working on the watch from hell...been a year now (not continuous).  In the mean time, I have serviced maybe 20 watches and ten clocks...so all is not lost.

Anyway, yesterday while working with the balance the thing flipped and the overcoil jumped inside the spiral.  This has happened before on other watches...at least once.  Because I have no backup, I had to solve this problem.  No choice.

First thing I did was push the collet into rodico to stabilize it and then, while under high microscope magnification, I used an old oiler that I had sharpened down to maybe 100 um to start in toward the inside of the collet, gently working my way to the outside of the spiral.  This continually pushed the the tangle outward.  At some point I hit a tangle and that was the first place to move the stud under the tangle and then out--hard to describe.  Thought I was done but I was not.  Repeated the process and found the final tangle.  Again, lifted the end where the tangle appeared and slipped the stud underneath and around.  Done.  Scary as hell.

Here is a crude picture of the idea.

[oldhippy]

I hate to say it but that is the way to do it. It got me out of it many times. 

[nickelsilver]

Good job- that's the textbook way to do it!