Bad Previous Repairs

[SwissSeiko]

I've seen many bad repairs in my day, but this one takes the cake. For an Elgin full plate movement, these have a very beautiful pallet fork. As you can see, this is a very incorrect pallet fork, and homemade. What have you guys seen for bad repairs?

[Kalanag]

Isn’t it a genious way to get the watch running again by investing just knowledge, skills and labour time?

It would be very interesting to hear about the time and circumstances of this repair.

Edited 7 hours ago by Kalanag

[RichardHarris123]

5 minutes ago, Kalanag said:

Isn’t it a genious way to get the watch running again by investing just knowledge, skills and labour time?

It would be very interesting to hear about the time and circumstances of this repair.

Fair point, it maybe not elegant but did it work?

[nickelsilver]

Just had in a very nice thin Patek pocketwatch. Came in for a staff; found out it had a random staff installed along with a random roller table- it didn't even engage with the fork. And best of all, a tooth was broken off the escape wheel.

 

It was extremely lucky that I had an escape wheel in my stock that was the correct diameter, also found a roller table that was able to be modifed and work very well with the fork, and made a new staff. Darn thing runs great now- around 270 flat, 30 degree drop in verts.

 

At least the former watchmaker did no permanent modifications.

[caseback]

2 hours ago, nickelsilver said:

At least the former watchmaker did no permanent modifications.

Thank the maker (to quote C3PO) for small favours..

[mbwatch]

1 hour ago, caseback said:

Thank the maker (to quote C3PO) for small favours..

Ha! But Luke really should have disassembled him rather than dunking him straight into the ultrasonic.

[oldhippy]

Idiots going made with solder, clock weights of the wrong size to get the clock to work. bad re-bushing such as protruding bush because the pivot has worn or broken, pallets bent to get the thing to escape. All this and more I have found in clocks. I would like to hit the buggers over the head with a rubber mallet.   

[watchweasol]

The worst I had was a A.zd.Mougin French clock where the anchor pivot had broken off, so they build up the pivot hole area with solder cut a hole in it for the shaft remainder and put the anchor back using the solder as a bearing for the shaft n not surprisingly it did not work for long. Bit of a mess to clean up. I have had others but this was a bit rough.