Fourth Wheel Washer

[GPrideaux]

I haven't seen this before. While examining the fourth wheel and extended pivot from a Seiko 6217 (and thinking about what to do about the rust), I noticed what appears to be a washer on the extended pivot. Is this normal?

Also, how much of a problem is the corrosion likely to be, assuming I can remove the superficial rust?

[mikepilk]

I can't find anything in the parts list showing a washer. A you sure it's not some sort of bearing that's pulled out? 

It might clean up OK, but I would look for a replacement part. It there's corrosion there, it must be in other places too, so it might be worth looking for a cheap donor movement. 

[GPrideaux]

Cheap donors for this watch are like rocking horse droppings. There is one movement on eBay at the moment in visibly poor condition with an asking price of US$1799.99. I might be able to source the odd individual part for a sane amount, but I'm going to try to clean it up with some Evaporust first then see how it runs.

Mike, where did you find a parts list for the 6217? I haven't been able to locate an original one, only what's on EmmyWatch and I'm not confident that list is 100% complete.

The fourth wheel is concentric with the centre wheel with the wheel and pinion sandwiched between the centre wheel bridge and the train wheel bridge so that the mysterious washer will have been between the fourth wheel pinion and the centre wheel bridge, sitting on the cover of the jewel that supports the centre wheel on the other side.

I'm optimistic that the fourth wheel might be usable. It seemed to clean up ok.

[mikepilk]

A useful source of service guides (apart from Cousins) is  https://watchguy.co.uk/cgi-bin/files

As you can see from the first pdf, the base calibre is 6205B. Most parts are shared but the centre seconds wheel (241500) is not. Check in the Jules Borel database to see which parts are common to other calibres. e.g.

16 minutes ago, GPrideaux said:

Cheap donors for this watch are like rocking horse droppings.

 

But it's often easy to find the correct parts, using the Jules Borel database and ebay. Just a quick search in ebay for "seiko seconds wheel" I found this in no time.

Seiko 6217A-17j.pdf 6205B-17j-Seikomatic-Selfdater.pdf

[GPrideaux]

Thanks, that's very helpful. I have three wheels on which I have seen a little rust: the third and escape wheels aren't as obvious as the sweep seconds but both have a few small dots of rust that cleaned up pretty well. The centre wheel looks good, although I can't get a good visual on the inside of the tube. I'm going to try it with the parts I have and if it runs well I'll let it go at that, otherwise I'll buy one or more parts.

It looks like someone has been creative with adding washers to the movement at some time in the past. There is also a washer that was sitting between the ratchet wheel and its screw. I think I'll see what happens if I remove them.

[SwissSeiko]

8 minutes ago, GPrideaux said:

Thanks, that's very helpful. I have three wheels on which I have seen a little rust: the third and escape wheels aren't as obvious as the sweep seconds but both have a few small dots of rust that cleaned up pretty well. The centre wheel looks good, although I can't get a good visual on the inside of the tube. I'm going to try it with the parts I have and if it runs well I'll let it go at that, otherwise I'll buy one or more parts.

It looks like someone has been creative with adding washers to the movement at some time in the past. There is also a washer that was sitting between the ratchet wheel and its screw. I think I'll see what happens if I remove them.

Often I find that with previously serviced watches, the little things the previous watchmaker did that don't make obvious sense to me, were necessary for repair.

[mikepilk]

Maybe someone fitted the washer to reduce end-shake? The fourth wheel on Seiko's is often close to the bridge and barrel. Too much end-shake and it could hit either, killing amplitude.

I have just serviced a Seiko 7019 where I had to reduce the end-shakes on both the centre wheel and centre seconds wheel. The jewels/bushes can get moved with people pushing the hands or cannon pinion on. Or the centre wheel bridge can be bent.

If you have a jewelling tool, it's quite easy to adjust the end-shakes. 

[Malocchio]

I've seen a washer in I think it was Seiko 83xx. At the time I couldn't figure out the reason for it. Here's a pic stolen from the internet:

There's no separate winding bridge so the 4th wheel jewel (I believe there was a jewel) is under the train bridge and you don't have access to it from the top side. If a seconds hand gets pushed too hard the jewel might shift deeper in the dead end so you'd have no means to reduce the end shake anymore other than break the jewel and insert new on a correct depth. That's where one might use a washer to reduce end shake.

Edited December 18, 2024 by Malocchio

[mikepilk]

On many Seiko's there is a tiny brass bush for the top of the 4th wheel in the centre of the pivot for the balance weight. You can see it in the pic.

Until I needed to reduce the end-shake of the 4th wheel in the 7019 I was working on, I hadn't realised this was a separate part. It's smaller (0.5mm) than the smallest pusher in my jewelling tool. To push it down I used a bit of guitar string in the pivot hole, then pushed it down using the jewelling tool.

 

[Neverenoughwatches]

8 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

an asking price of US$1799.99. 

I'm thinking/ hoping that is one 9 too many. And since I'm studying maths and you are a retired maths teacher, we should discuss your whole numbers and decimal point placement here .

5 minutes ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

 

 

8 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

but I'm going to try to clean it up with some Evaporust first then see how it runs.

 

That stuff can really naff up the steel, I would try something milder first. Evaporust is approaching the big guns.

Edited December 18, 2024 by Neverenoughwatches

[mikepilk]

I doubt you need a donor movement. If you do a simple ebay search for "Seiko 6217", there's plenty of parts for sale. All the wheels in the gear train available for example. And that's without checking parts common to other movements. 

[Neverenoughwatches]

3 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

Thanks, that's very helpful. I have three wheels on which I have seen a little rust: the third and escape wheels aren't as obvious as the sweep seconds but both have a few small dots of rust that cleaned up pretty well. The centre wheel looks good, although I can't get a good visual on the inside of the tube. I'm going to try it with the parts I have and if it runs well I'll let it go at that, otherwise I'll buy one or more parts.

It looks like someone has been creative with adding washers to the movement at some time in the past. There is also a washer that was sitting between the ratchet wheel and its screw. I think I'll see what happens if I remove them.

Rust at contact areas are the ones that pull on the amplitude,  and grind up steel and ruby. Pivots typically seem to be rust magnets, suffer more than the rest of the wheel and do the most after damage.

3 hours ago, SwissSeiko said:

Often I find that with previously serviced watches, the little things the previous watchmaker did that don't make obvious sense to me, were necessary for repair.

Often additions were logically applied by someone with some knowledge. Missing items and reductions are often made by breakers

[VWatchie]

12 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

Also, how much of a problem is the corrosion likely to be, assuming I can remove the superficial rust?

Generally, rust and oxidation have a very negative effect on a movement. In my experience, even the slightest imperfection on wheel pivots (and jewel holes) increases friction, thereby reducing amplitude. How much it affects, of course, varies. Then again, it’s naturally a matter of what demands and expectations one has. A movement can keep time very well even if everything isn’t entirely perfect.

I’m not sure how experienced you are, but if you’re relatively new, my best advice is to lower your expectations a bit and try to enjoy the small progress you make step by step as you learn more.

Good luck!

[GPrideaux]

5 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

I'm thinking/ hoping that is one 9 too many.

Quite right. I misremembered the 99 cents. It's actually only one thousand seven hundred and ninety nine US dollars and zero cents. I'll be buying any individual parts I need separately. The train wheels can be had in Australia for between AU$44 and AU$47 from VTA.

5 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

Pivots typically seem to be rust magnets

The business ends of the pivots actually look clear of rust or I wouldn't be considering reusing the parts. The bits I'm most hesitant about are where there are some tiny dots of rust on the leaves of the pinion on the third wheel and escape wheel. And when I say tiny, I would not have seen them at all before I got my stereo microscope.

2 hours ago, VWatchie said:

I’m not sure how experienced you are, but if you’re relatively new, my best advice is to lower your expectations a bit and try to enjoy the small progress you make step by step as you learn more.

I am relatively inexperienced. I've worked on a couple of dozen watches all up but that includes a handful of simple quartz repairs/battery replacments. This is my fourth mechanical Seiko, I think. My expectations are modest: I'm not looking for perfection but I want the watch to run and be wearable by its owner, otherwise there's not much point, is there? This is not just a practice movement: if I need to do something to it that I haven't done before I will practice on one of my junk movements first.

5 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

Often additions were logically applied by someone with some knowledge. Missing items and reductions are often made by breakers

Thanks, I'll bear that in mind. I can see how that might apply to the washer on the fourth wheel. It's harder to see the point of the washer on the ratchet wheel, but I guess its probably doing no harm.

[Neverenoughwatches]

2 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

Quite right. I misremembered the 99 cents. It's actually only one thousand seven hundred and ninety nine US dollars and zero cents.

Really !!  I was meaning a nine more towards middle of the whole dollars . That's ridiculous, and for a donor movement

2 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

The business ends of the pivots actually look clear of rust or I wouldn't be considering reusing the parts. The bits I'm most hesitant about are where there are some tiny dots of rust on the leaves of the pinion on the third wheel and escape wheel. And when I say tiny, I would not have seen them at all before I got my stereo microscope.

A couple of goes in an ultrasonic might pop these off. Otherwise I've followed some advice before on cleaning between pinion leaves with autosol polish. Time consuming but seemed to work well.

[VWatchie]

7 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

Otherwise I've followed some advice before on cleaning between pinion leaves with autosol polish.

Another method described by @nickelsilver is to drop degreaser into the pith wood and then run the pinions into the pith wood. Naturally, this doesn't help much against rust, but it dissolves all other organic or fat-soluble material. I use it all the time.

10 hours ago, GPrideaux said:

The business ends of the pivots actually look clear of rust or I wouldn't be considering reusing the parts.

I have restored several movements where the wheel pivots appeared fine even under high magnification in my stereo microscope but still turned out to have micro-rust, micro-oxidation, and small, almost invisible wear marks. While this hasn’t caused the movement to stop working, it has still affected its performance to varying degrees. A good way to thoroughly clean wheel pivots is by using Eveflex, but in that case, only use the softest variant and avoid working for too long, as it may shape the pivot into a cone.

The ultimate solution for getting wheel pivots in perfect condition is to use a Jacot tool. There’s no rush to acquire a Jacot tool, but sooner or later, you’ll want to restore wheel pivots to mint condition, and there’s no better option for this. There’s quite a bit to learn to succeed with a Jacot tool, but one vital aspect is knowing how to hold the burnisher and practising this skill.

[GPrideaux]

On 12/19/2024 at 8:56 AM, GPrideaux said:

It's harder to see the point of the washer on the ratchet wheel, but I guess its probably doing no harm.

I think I've discovered the purpose of the washer on the ratchet wheel. I reassembled the movement (excluding the dial side bits) without it and find that when the mainspring has some wind in it, the ratchet wheel wants to slip over the top of the click in some positions. I'm guessing that the washer was there to address this problem by holding the ratchet wheel lower. I'm still not sure it's the best solution, but if it works I may let it be. I'm letting the watch run a bit before I put the washer back in place as I dislike letting the wind down on these Seiko movements without manual winding ... one slip and it unwinds all at once, and when the click is unreliable it'll be that much harder to do it safely bit by bit.

Edited December 24, 2024 by GPrideaux
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